In Time
by Galliar
Summary: It has taken countless tries, but Frisk got his happy ending. The monsters, Frisk, and Asriel have returned to the surface. So what comes next? When Sans finds evidence of another time traveler, Frisk, Asriel, and Sans leave Ebott behind to find out what's happening.
1. Captured in a Portrait

**Chapter 1: Captured in a Portrait**

 **May 15, 2013**

 _The news exploded today. It was like some kind of crazy ass sci-fi, come to life. The mole people have emerged, and they're after our sunlight or something. It really was some 'we are not alone in the universe' kind of shit. Except, we weren't even alone on our own planet._

 _I'm still not sure I believe it. It was just April, it could just be a really, REALLY late April Fools prank, and the entire government is in on it. And so is every single large news company out there. And hundred of thousands of people, if not millions in Virginia and the D.C. Area. Damn East Coasters._

 _All just one big prank. Right?_

 _Except, Kristen has relatives over there, and she showed us the pictures that they've sent. And videos. Monsters, just... Marching out of the side of a mountain. Monsters parading through the streets, talking to each other, looking at everything like it was... I don't know. I can't read inhuman features very well, I guess._

 _They can't be in on the conspiracy too, can they? Kristen's relatives, I mean. Maybe they are, because the alternative is absolutely insane to consider. Actual, real life monsters crawled out of the ground, with their huge teeth and claws and their big, buggy eyes. And to top it all off, diary, they come in peace?_

 _That would mean a skeleton really did shake hands with the president. I have the picture open on my computer right now. Their ambassador apparently, appointed by their king. A giant goat man. And I can't tell if it's Photoshopped. I'm trying so hard to find anything about it that is off. A pixel, blurred in objects... I can't find anything! There's nothing wrong with the picture and no obvious tampering anywhere._

 _Did I eat something weird? Is there something in the water, and the entire country is just high, all at once? Has Climate Change finally melted all of our brains and we're all sharing the same collective hallucination? Just... How can this even be real?_

 _Okay, so, I live in Seattle, and I'm into photography. I'm practically obligated to be open-minded, no matter what, aren't I? But, and excuse my language diary, how the fuck am I supposed to just accept literal monsters?_

 _Okay, I've said it. Got my initial freak out out of the way. Open mind, Max. Open mind. This... Could be good. Great, even. Even if things went bad, how many games have we made where humanity beats the big bad beasts? And that's with swords and bows and stuff._

 _That's not open minded at all. 'At least we can kill them if we wanted to!' Smooth. Real pacifistic._

 _I'm going to have to think about this. Talk to Mom and Dad. They're probably freaking out just as much as me, and if I make them pretend they know everything so that they're baby girl isn't scared we should all feel better._

* * *

Birds were singing, flowers were blooming. The sun was baring down brilliantly on Mt. Ebott in the distance. If one squinted, they might have even seen the entrance to the Underground. The mouth of the cavern was a lightless speck of inevitability, two thirds the length of a bony finger away from the peak.

On days like this, skeletons like Sans should just slack off and do absolutely nothing. Sure, the same could have been said of the day before that, and likely the day after too. Turns out, every day was great for doing nothing. Just that with this weather, one could take that nothing outside.

Not that Sans did nothing all day. The surface had taken him through a few jobs, all part time of course. And easy to not do much of anything at. Somehow, he hadn't been fired from his most recent gig selling hot dogs yet. Most likely because hot dog stacking was good for business, even if it drove the boss nuts. His hot cats weren't so hot with the customers, but the heat didn't melt away the reliability he had gotten by accident.

The fast food joint he'd tried working at didn't keep him for long after he passed out at the grill, and retail was a no go once the managers realized they would never teach him how to fold the shirts. Not to mention the sock incident. All of that, just in the month they'd been out on the surface.

Right now, it was too early for his nothing doing to take him to his job at the hot dog cart. His favorite customers wouldn't be there yet, either. It was late May on a Thursday. Kids apparently had schooling five days a week on the surface, and Sans wasn't planning on taking that away from them today. Not like either of the kids would ever detract from his life in any way for the fun of it. No, they'd do it for 'a good reason.'

The permanent grin that was ever etched on his face never faltered, though anyone watching may have noticed his misstep. _Heh, there's a grim thought._ An unfair one, too, given all that he knew the two of them had gone through. Or did they put themselves through it? Hard to say, when he both was and wasn't there for most of it.

Ebott Park wasn't quite abuzz with activity. A few older folks were out, enjoying the nice weather and chatting about human stuff. Whatever old people talked about in these modern times. Politics maybe. Their grand children. Or that the world has changed for the worse, obviously, because there was a skeleton in pink slippers, a hoody and shorts soiling their park. Maybe he had a bit of ketchup on his shirt. He wasn't going to change anything about that especially, since he knew it drove Papyrus nuts.

He pulled out his phone - because 'of course he had to have one, everyone has one!' - and checked the time. If nothing else, it made keeping track of his meals everyday easier. Noon already. And he'd just had breakfast an hour ago. Brunch had only been half an hour ago, and now it was time for lunch, already? Gee, how the time flew when he wasn't working.

With a shrug, Sans shoved his phone and his hands back in his pockets. He removed himself from the stone path and stepped behind a tree. The birds over head couldn't find where the little slipper-print trail took him.

It was good for Sans that his little shortcuts didn't rely on the credibility of birds. They probably wouldn't have worked awfully well in the Underground if they had. For the birds, he simply vanished under the branches. For Sans, he took behind one step behind the tree, and the next step brought him to the door of Grillby's new place on the surface. It wasn't exactly homely yet, given they had only been out on the surface little more than a month, but the jukebox was still busted. So, there was that.

"Hey, Sans!" Dogaressa greeted as he entered. Her husband Dogamy greeted him similarly, whilst Doggo slid in his greeting cautiously afterwards. The dog couple had given up their old cowls, due to the human association of the outfits with executioners and cults. Even if the Royal Guard had been disbanded, and technically they were under the protection of the United States government, Asgore's request that they try to meet humanity in the middle had driven the two of them to get proper outfits, and human jobs. The blue uniforms of the EPD were surprisingly fitting on the two of them.

Whether the Ebott Police Academy had taken them in based on qualifications or on diversity quotas was up to debate, given the frailty of monsters. The politics of it all didn't bug Sans whilst they were out here. Their K-9 badges were especially hilarious. How did humans get so clever?

There was a noticeable empty suit of armor where a bundle of dog had been half an hour ago.

"hey there. where's g. dog?" Sans asked. He peered at the table they were sitting at, chips down and dog treats to the side.

"He saw a car and got excited. Bolted after it just after you left last time," Dogamy answered.

"I still don't believe there was a car out there," Doggo said. A pair of bulbous glasses laid over his eyes. It wasn't really clear what was holding them up, given they had been designed by a human, for a human. Wasn't Doggo's ears, that was certain. Sans had just chalked it up to magic the first time he'd seen it and moved on. It was incredibly probable, given they were magical dogs.

"gotcha," Sans said, ignoring the last dog's skepticism. "can't say i'd do the same myself, i'd be _bone_ tired by the end of it." He stayed quiet for a moment as the groans and pity laughs greeted his joke. "and how's about your parents?"

"They're still at Alphys's for a checkup," Doggo said, a frown on his muzzle. "Just like they were half an hour ago."

Sans shrugged, pulling his hands out his pockets for the first time since he entered the place.

"hey, a lot can change in thirty minutes. or even thirty seconds."

"Such as?" Doggo pushed grumpily. Geez, those glasses had to really be bugging him. Only seeing not moving things had to be driving him nuts, after years of seeing only moving things. Did help him read the cards in front of him without shaking his hands around. Why didn't he just take them off?

"well, i could be ordering food in thirty seconds."

That got a laugh. With a wink, Sans departed from their table. He'd stopped to greet a few of the other regulars as he went, politely refusing invitations to join this person and that monster at their seat. Behind the counter, a straightened out tangle of black hair was humming away to a tuneless tune, and cleaning a glass. When the hairs' owner peeked up to see who was sitting in the stool, the human girl's expression twisted oddly.

"Sans? You're back again? Already?" That was the young human at the counter, who called herself Natalie. Nice girl, and a bit of a curiosity. Taking a job at a monster establishment, when there was still so much controversy over the fact that monsters even existed? Sans had to respect that.

"of course i am. i haven't had lunch yet, Nat," Sans answered cheekily. Natalie was just too many syllables, and there wasn't enough time in the day for that.

The girl had only been there a few days, and didn't seem like she was any more used to his regularity at the establishment. Sans would have preferred Grillby himself behind the counter to take his order, but there was some difficulty for the poor fire monster. Namely, the main part of the new Grillby's hadn't been meticulously fireproofed yet. Wouldn't do any good for business if the place burned down during open hours. The kitchen was both less flammable and more on fire, so that was where he was trapped until he got that done.

Natalie shook her head. To her credit, she was adapting to the oddity of serving monsters pretty well. Especially when compared with the last kid. That one had broken Grillby's number one rule for anyone in his establishment, monsters and non-monsters alike. The fire door was for his use, and his alone. Safety rule, not a territory thing. Can't take the heat, don't walk into an actual oven. The health and safety suit was going to be weird. First time a monster would be in court for any reason, preceding even whether they were American citizens.

That one would be a fun argument to watch. Sans had figured that even though they hadn't been born on American soil, they _had_ been born under it.

"Okay then. What can I get you?" She asked.

"how about you let grills know he's got some fries to make?" Sans told her. The girl rolled her eyes, and tapped a few buttons on the register.

"And there we go. Should be out in a few minutes. That'll be..." She pressed a few more buttons before Sans held up a hand.

"tab it." Sans instructed. Nat rolled her eyes.

"Of course. I won't be surprised by any of this in a week, will I?" She asked him. Sans shrugged.

"depends. sunlight get any easier on the eyes?" He shot back. Natalie frowned.

"You're not supposed to look directly at it. You'll burn out your eyes." Sans paused for a second, and just looked at the girl with widened eye sockets. She kept her face stolid for a solid few seconds, and he started to believe she actually meant it. Then her lip twitched upward, and they both started to laugh. As they shared in the mirth, a little window slid open behind Natalie and a tray of fries slipped through it.

"i'll have to keep that in mind. i'd hate to lose these peepers," Sans joked as she slid the fries in front of him. She passed him a bottle of ketchup with a proud smile still on her face.

"Finally, a joke sticks," She beamed. Her brow quirked up as Sans took the bottle she'd laid out. "Should I charge you extra for that?"

"do i get to keep it if you do?"

"Keep it anyways, since you're going to be emptying it. Make sure you eat some of your side of fries with it."

Sans laughed again as Natalie stepped away. He shoved a single magical fry into his face before popping open the bottle of ketchup and starting to chug. Who was he to disappoint, after all?

Lunch was over as quickly as it began. He hadn't been there for fifteen minutes before he was done and saying his see you laters. His shift began at 1:00 in the afternoon. The time in between he lazed around the park once more, catching a few zzz's in his last bits of free time. He'd almost caught a letter y once, but it got away. At 12:50, he was stretching out and standing up, and moments later he had vanished again.

He reappeared in the unforgivable pile of filth that Sans referred to as his room. Armageddon itself could have awaited in the hodgepodge, but he'd never know. Socks, a ball of laundry, and mess that would have been a catastrophe anywhere else. And yet, this was only the beginning of his schemes. He hadn't created a new trash tornado yet, after all.

He found his work hat quick enough, a hot dog and slipped it on. He didn't have any outfit otherwise. At 12:58, he was heading out the door.

His boss was pulling out his phone when Sans showed up behind him. Probably to call him, and ask where he was. He patted the older man on the back as way of greeting. The man recoiled as the sound of flatulence started to emitted from Sans's hand. The whoopee cushion fell unceremoniously to the ground.

"Good god, Sans!" The man squawked. Red faced and flustered, the skeleton's boss turned down to glare at him. "Where were you?"

"getting ready for work," was the answer given. Sans's white iris's flicked upwards towards the hot dog hat he wore. Boss man pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Fine. Take over. Shift ends at five," the boss said as he started to walk away. Before he got to far, he turned and pointed a finger at the skeleton. "No exceptions, this time. I don't care how famous your brother is, you either work here for me, or you work for him."

Sans shrugged. "okay."

And with that his boss departed. _A cool headed man all around,_ Sans thought. Honestly, Sans just thought the man was angry at the world. He didn't seem to be angry at either him or monsters in particular. It didn't bug Sans really. No marrow off his bones.

Course, he didn't really have many customers for the first two hours. The boss had already covered the early waves of emergency lunch people. Still a few of them were coming up to him, humans in suits and burgeoning monster employees alike. The monsters were excited to see Sans. Who wouldn't be? He 'preformed' at the MTT Resort in the Underground before, and he was the brother of the Great Ambassador Papyrus.

The bulk of his customers were tourists. People from all over the globe wanted to see the infamous city of monsters. It wasn't a surprise, given Asgore's efforts to get as much of humanity comfortable with the presence of monsters as possible, before they could teach the next generation how to feel about them. It was a pretty clever move from the king, especially given his imperfect reputation for all things clever. It was probably his experience, and how he'd taught the better part entire generation or two of monsters to hate humans with the war. A mistake that a certain human child had solved by being so lovable to everyone, and bringing hope back to the monsters. Nothing big really.

Part of the king's plan was tourism. Ebott's mayor had been helping with the push too. Asgore and the monsters did tourism, humans did business as usual, and a few of the downsides of a tourism based economy dissipated. Didn't stop the littering or vandalism, though.

"yeah, i'll take a picture with ya. it'll be a snap," he'd told one couple, ending with a wink. The man chuckled whilst his companion groaned. He stood beside the guy, who was a comfortable two feet taller than him and looked up at the phone. The man held his camera in the air and pointed it down at the three of them so they could all be in the picture.

"Thanks, I appreciate it," the man said. "Now, about that hot dog..."

Overall, it wasn't a lot of work. Grill hot dog, give hot dog, take cash, give change, be a skeleton. Nap, if the opportunity arises. Much as he slept, Sans was good at waking up when he needed to. It was a talent, and one that he hid well. Wouldn't do any good if he couldn't pretend to be asleep on demand.

The city moved past his little stand quickly. Whilst the street was a bit out of the way from most shopping and touristy stuff, a handful of traveling cars from across the country passed by him. It was a relatively safe neighborhood, really. Quite a few monsters could afford to live so close to center city, given that they came to the surface with gold. Sure, the shiny rock's value was depreciating fast around them, but that hadn't happened yet when they first emerged.

That sure didn't do anything to drum up support from the skeptics, but what are you gonna do? Not like they could all turn back time and do it again.

"Sans!" The kids' voices were the very essence of young and sweet. He didn't know whether to really believe they were, but he didn't have proof they weren't. _Someone_ messing with time made it hard to keep track of the details.

Two kids bounced up his stand, their colorful shirts, bright backpacks and overall familiarity made them stand out from the crowd. On the human boy's head, a mess of long brown hair struggled to keep up with its owner in blue. Two purple stripes lined his shirt. On the other, yellow stripes against a lime green covered the mat of white fur that covered him from the tips of his droopy ears, up the length of his snout and down to his toes.

"sup, kids." Sans greeted. "whatever are you doing here?" He knew, but that wasn't how the game was played.

"Coming to see my second favorite skeleton," Frisk answered.

"really? just second?"

"Papyrus," Frisk answered, a small smirk on his face. Sans shrugged.

"true. guess i just can't compete," Sans answered. "and how about the prince?"

"Um... I wanted a hot cat?" the monster child questioned meekly. It was an attempt at a joke.

"sorry asriel, no can do. only have 'dogs today."

"Yeah, with the apostrophe. Guess it'll have to do, then," the prince acceded in what was meant to be a playful tone. He sounded tense instead. Of course, Asriel always seemed tense to him. He didn't understand why, he was a stand up guy. He knew his mother the queen well enough, he got along with his dad. Maybe it was something to do with having died. Skeletons were a symbol of death among humans, and Asriel was spending lots of time around a human.

Sans never got the full story of how that happened, exactly. He just knew it was thanks to Frisk that the dead Prince Dreemur was now less deaded. He assumed Tori knew how it happened, given how she looked at her son whenever he went over. It was a hard to read face, which drove down the entire length of the visible spectrum of emotion and then just kept on going.

Sans shrugged it off. No use dilly dallying when there were 'dogs to prepare.

"So how's Papyrus been?" Frisk asked conversationally. "It's been a few days since I heard from him, and all he's told me about what he's been up to has been that it's," Frisk cleared his throat. His voice went up a few decibels as he finished with "GREAT AND PROGRESSIVE!"

Asriel laughed at the impression and Sans let out a snort. The birds fled from a nearby telephone line, and passing folks stared down the disruptive child.

"yeah, that sounds right. i could tell you." San started as he rolled the 'dogs on the grill. The kids both perked up a bit. "but then, why would i want to ruin the surprise?"

"Aw come on, Sans. Please?" Frisk whimpered. Sans looked at the large human eyes that shimmered at with. Kiddy pout of the century.

"nah."

Frisk frowned, and let out the breath he was holding. He turned to his partner in crime. "It's okay. I already know Muffet's involved, so I'll just ask her."

"Or Dad!" Asriel added. "I could definitely get him to crack."

Frisk smiled weakly at that, but nodded at it anyway. Sans was definitely missing something there. Then they looked back at Sans.

"nice try, but tricks are not going to work on me. i break before i bend." Sans smiled down at them. They didn't seem to find that very funny either, did they? And he thought he was being so clever. Then he turned back to the dogs, and lifted two up in his narrow marrow fingers. He didn't have skin to burn, so he didn't feel the heat. He placed them in two different buns, wrapped them in napkins, and handed them to the kids over the cart. "here you go. two dogs, absolutely fresh. means you'll have to potty train 'em."

Asriel looked up at him with an odd twist of the snout, and stuck out his tongue in disgust. Frisk snorted before biting down on the dog.

"uh, kid? 'fresh off' means they're still hot."

Frisk looked up at him and nodded. It was a strained motion that betrayed just how aware Frisk was of his mistake. With a shake of the head, Sans pulled a water bottle out of the cart and handed it to the kid.

"on the house." Frisk took the bottle from his savior gratefully and started to chug it without mercy. Would've been a good opportunity for a prank, but Sans couldn't think of anything that didn't seem to be in bad taste. Like hot sauce instead of water. He was a skeleton of with standards at the very height of the low standards. Frisk still looked hilarious chugging down the water. By the flash of light and the ubiquitous clicking of the Prince's camera, it was evident Asriel thought the same.

"Athree-el!" Frisk complained water still sloshing in his mouth. The prince ignored him as the photo slid out of the camera. Asriel shook the picture a bit and smiled at his work.

"Perfect!" He cheered with a pump of his little fist. Sans chuckled a bit. Was that how those instant camera photos were supposed to work? Pull 'em out and shake? Seemed like it'd ruin the picture, but what did Sans know.

"you better run along now. your mother is going to be worried if you take too long. same with your dad, if he hears about it." In that case, they'd get one hell of a _bleating._ He kept that joke to himself.

With a smile and a thank you, the kids ran off with their hot dogs in hand. The joy of seeing the kids got him through the rest of his shift awake. It had been a few days since he was scheduled to work the cart, and he hadn't seen them in as long. He had other jobs to occupy his time, but they didn't put him on the kids' path to the bus stop from their school.

He threw his hat somewhere in his room without a care, and sat down down on his mattress. Calling it a bed would have been generous. He kicked off his slippers, took off his coat, and leaned back on the uncovered pillow. The strangest thing happened when he laid down.

He couldn't fall asleep. He did everything right. Closing his eyes, getting comfortable. Snoring. Yet, he had laid there for a while, and sleep just didn't happen. Could have been hours, could have been minutes. Nothing. What did that mean?

He still laid there a while longer, just to make sure. There was an itch, though. Did seeing the kids today do something to him? Or was he just... inspired? He sure didn't feel especially awake, but something was definitely nagging at him to get out of bed.

With a groan, Sans creaked his cricker and cracked his back to an upright position in a slow and monotonous grind. No matter what the universe itself was demanding of him when he'd rather be snoozing, he was going to take his time. Given that the urge was neither going away nor growing, he wasn't going to push himself either. That'd just be productive. He slipped the slippers on, stretching out his toes in them. He threw his hoodie back on, and then he stood. Point of no return, there. _Guess I'm doing something now._

He just didn't know what that something was yet.

For the first time that day, Sans forewent his shortcuts and just stepped out his door into the apartment proper. Where his room was small and messy, the rest of the place was grand and enchanting. Only the best suite for the monster's ambassador, of course. Best view that the King's gold could afford. Asgore himself wasn't living in the city center, he loved his greenery too much for it.

Papyrus, on the other hand, loved the view of Mount Ebott in the distance. He also loved the apartment itself, and how important it made him feel incredibly important. Not that he wasn't always important, he was Sans's brother, but validation made it all the better. Being able to meet someone new every three steps outside of their apartment building was perhaps the taller skeleton's favorite part.

Sans' room was on the second level, connected by a balcony that hung over the main room. Papyrus's was the next one over, distinctly less sticker-y than either of the skeletons would have liked. Asgore had somehow managed to talk the younger skeleton down to a conservative handful of stickers and a single stripe of tape. Given that Papyrus was the monster ambassador, he did have to be presentable in some human ways. The king couldn't ask Papyrus not to be Papyrus, that was what made him so cool after all. He could ask him to meet the humans in the middle on at least decor, though.

The sacrifices made for the greater good.

It was a bother, but given that this suite was technically a perk of Papyrus's job, they could deal with it. In return, any guests they hosted stayed both comfortable and in good humer-f(em)ur-us. Yeah, cross that one away. That was a stretch, even for him.

There was a dining area tucked into the corner of the main room, with a long table and particularly decorative bones in the vase at its center. It was a very, very tidy space. It was where Papyrus fed and greeted his guests, after all! And they would only ever have the best! And the guests would be so wrapped up in how great Papyrus was, and how great the apartment was, they'd have to also see how great the spaghetti was!

It reached the bare minimum of edible. Only so much could change in the month they had been out. It had improved since Undyne turned over teaching to an actual chef. Being a police officer, caring girlfriend, and one of the strongest, if not the strongest monster in the world didn't leave much time for her cooking lessons. Even with her lack of culinary skills no longer holding Papyrus back, it wasn't enough to make up for him just not having taste buds. There was a reason Sans kept himself scarce when things got political, and as much as he loved his brother, it wasn't just the history-making in the kitchen.

Sans looked at a clock. 6:00. He hadn't even stayed down for an hour. Papyrus wouldn't be back for at another hour yet. Regardless of how his and Asgore's deal ends up, he'd still need to take the time to inform anyone involved. Mourn or celebrate as necessary. He'd call as soon as he could. Sans just might be able to answer, since he was awake anyway.

Sans moseyed down the stairs, and figured the kitchen was the best place to start he search for what urged him. Could just be the urge to eat. Sure, it never kept him up before since he lacked the internal organs to actually digest any of it, but it was a possibility. Or a distraction.

One bag of chips later, he decided that wasn't the case. He put the bag into the trash can gently, pressing down to give his brother as much leeway in the future as he could. Trash was a apparently a serious problem on the surface, or so Sans had been told. He'd have to ask Alphys about the truth there, given that Trashmotology had never actually been his field. Wait, that thought came out wrong. He'd meant that she was a more well diversified scientist than...

 _who am i justifying myself to?_ No one that he knew could read minds.

Snacked out, and given that the evidence was effectively disposed of, Sans wandered the house. Nothing came up in the foyer with its chairs and rugs, nothing in the living area and that beautiful widescreen. Nothing in the guest bedroom, either. Probably a good thing, there. No one was staying over right now.

The study did trigger something though. An itch in the back of his cranium. Although a flick of a switch could bring light into the room, it failed to shed light on his urge to do something. He walked into the room warily, ready for something to happen. Nothing did. He expected something to jump out at him when he turned around, but still nada.

Then he saw the door tucked away in the back. The door was dusty and unused, and had been since Sans asked Papyrus not to go in there. Was that why he was here? Well, no time like the present.

Sans pushed open the door, and gone was the comfortable hardwood. It was replaced by cold tiles, and a claustrophobic hallway that lacked the personality of the rest of their home. It was a soulless room with only one way in and out. That's apparently where he wanted to be.

He was amazed the lights even worked for him. There was a desk built into the wall, drawers and cabinets underneath. Just like in Snowdin. At the end of the thin walk-in-closet-turned-evil-lab was a machine, wrapped in cloth. Not what he was here for, right?

Sans was feeling uneasy just being in this room. He'd been doing a surprisingly good job so far of moving past this. Sure, the timeline could reset at any moment and he's be trapped all over again, but why not enjoy this reality as best he could? _Don't answer that question._

He sidled over to the desk, sliding his hand down it and sweeping the first clumps of dust bunnies off of it. He hadn't been gone from the lab that long. They'd just finished settling into the place two weeks ago. Even dust bunnies didn't breed that quickly. A peculiar thought, since he knew a few rabbits personally. Nice people.

He stopped just short of the machine, draped in cloth and failure. He never got that thing working, and no cosmic anything would be fixing it either.

Perhaps the lab wasn't where he needed to be? No, he'd never pass up a nap willingly. He had a reputation to uphold. What the hell was keeping him awake?

His eyes darted to the first drawer. It slid open, and a familiar couple of images looked back up at him. One was fairly old drawing, and the other was a timeless photograph. Literally, the photograph never happened. Never would. No way Toriel would allow a picture of all of them without Asriel in it, and that kid was learning his pictures well enough that he would've put it on a timer to get in if he had been there. It was all of the rest of them, on the surface. And he'd had that photo since the kid first came back to this timeline. Who knows how many other Sanses out in the multiverse had it.

The other picture had its own state of limbo about it. Three people who didn't exist anymore, just as Sans wanted to remember them. Smiling. Not that Sans was an artist. Picture was kind of awful, if he was being honest with himself. Not like he was besmirching anyone else's memory of them. In the corner, a younger Sans had wrote a message to himself. 'don't forget.'

Was that why he was here? To remember? Nah, that didn't sound right. The elevator dinged in the distance.

"SANS?" His brother shouted. He sounded excited. "I'M HOME! WHERE ARE YOU?" And he hadn't even called to tell him he was coming back? That wasn't very much like Papyrus.

"in the room you're not allowed in," Sans answered. He heard the sound of boots scraping the wooden floor of the study after a minute, but he couldn't see his brother when he stopped. Papyrus never broke that rule. It had been the only request Sans had made of his brother when they moved out into the city.

"YOU HAVEN'T GONE IN THERE FOR WEEKS. ARE YOU OKAY?" It was a gentle question, which was still a shout for Papyrus.

"yeah, should be bro. i know you won't believe it, but insomnia of all things hit me."

Paps gasped dramatically, as though he had just been told the world was ending and that pig-men actually couldn't fly. "I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU THEN! SOMETHING HAPPENED! AND AS YOUR BROTHER, IT'S MY JOB TO FIX IT!"

"just a sprout of productivity whittling away at me. couldn't fight it, bro. too lazy to fight." Papyrus's gasp was happier this time. Sans felt guilty, lying like that. He really had no idea why he was in here.

"OH MY GOD! YOU CAN'T FOOL ME, SANS! YOU'RE JUST NOT BEING LAZY? THAT'S GREAT!" The joy in his brother's voice felt nice. He should do something a bit more often, if that's how it was always met.

"yea. guess i'll turn these lazy bones into productive bones." There was a groan. "it'd be a shin to stop now that you've got my backbone."

"I TAKE BACK EVERYTHING!" Papyrus groaned. He didn't mean it, and that was obvious, but Papyrus was great at playing along. Lots of experience around lots of bad jokes changed a person. His voice lowered slightly. "IS THERE ANYTHING I COULD DO FOR YOU?"

Sans let out a snort. His brother almost sounded tired, himself, yet here he was worrying after him. "if i need anything, you'll be the first to know, bro. right now, i just need to find out where to even start."

"OKAY! I WILL JUST BE OUT HERE. IN THE APARTMENT. NOT WORRYING ABOUT MY BROTHER."

"okay. sounds good."

There was not the sound of Papyrus walking away. With a sigh, Sans got back to digging through the drawers. Nothing else was really in the lab. A few tools, the broken machine, pictures. Blueprints for the machine, written in symbols that he only had the scarcest memories of. Of the several machines the blue paper depicted, he only knew enough about one of the machines to maybe build it again. Smaller machine, just a scanning device. Still a power drain, though, and needy. And it required a lot of things that didn't exist anymore. Sans stared at those blueprints for a moment longer.

Maybe those pieces could be replaced?

Was that why he was here?

His brother's silence was incredibly distracting. Knowing he was out there waiting, even more so.

"how'd your deal go?"

"IT WENT GREAT! MUFFET AND HER SPIDER FRIENDS SHOULD BE HEADING TO THE OTHER COAST IN A COUPLE OF WEEKS!" The excitement was palpable. Sans spread out the blueprints, trying to figure why he would even want or need the machine again. It hadn't survived the initial accident.

"they agreed, then? guess that means all the others are moving out too?"

"YES, THEY ARE! THE AQUARIUM MONSTERS SHOULD BE IN THE SEA IN A MATTER OF MONTHS! SNOWDRAKE AND HIS FAMILY ARE GOING NORTH TO NEW YORK, PAID FOR BY METTATON!"

Sans's smile felt especially genuine for a minute. Frisk was going to love that when he heard, considering how hard he'd tried to get them out. The fact that monster kind was actually integrating at all was amazing. Lucky, really.

He traced his finger across the symbols, and then over his loose translations below. He couldn't build this alone. He didn't have the mechanical know-how.

"IT IS A GOOD THING WE ALL WILL KEEP CONTACT, THAT WAY I WON'T HAVE TO MISS THEM!" Papyrus added. Sans didn't believe that for a second.

"course." Sans wasn't sure what to say. His brother had gotten a bit famous amongst monsters, being their representative and all. He cares for every single one with all his heart, and even if it was what they wanted, Sans knew his brother was already dreading the idea of any of them not being close by. "hey, bro. remind me where it was everyone's going?"

"OKAY! I JUST TOLD YOU, BUT I'M HAPPY TO TELL YOU AGAIN! THE SNOW FAMILY ARE GOING TO NEW YORK, FOR THEIR COMEDY GIG. FISH MONSTER'S WILL BE DROPPED INTO THE ATLANTIC AT THE JERSEY SHORE-" Sans could practically feel the disgust his brother held for that place - "AND MUFFET'S GOING OUT WEST, SOME SMALL TOWN IN ORGAN."

"oregon, bro." A pause.

"OF COURSE I KNEW THAT. I WAS JUST MAKING SURE YOU DID TOO."

"okay. what town?"

"IT WAS... ER... ARCADIA... DOCK? NO, BAY. ARCADIA BAY."

Sans hmm'd under his breath. Sans knew most of what Papyrus had said, since it wasn't the first time they'd talked about it. Papyrus always kept him up to date on his work. Sans didn't return the favor normally, since there wasn't much exciting about selling hot dogs and getting fired.

He'd known that Muffet had wanted to go somewhere where her spider folks could be safe from others, humans and monsters alike. They were the monsters that probably had it the worst of all, since they were barely distinguishable from normal spiders. Even normal spiders, Muffet cherished. Almost as much as money, the second reason she wanted to go out there. She'd be only a day's drive away from Seattle.

Apparently there was some prestigious school there too, or something. Rich kids, quick bucks. Money she could spend in the city, whenever she took her limo there.

Sans looked the blueprints up and down one last time.

"saw the kids today. frisk tried to eat a 'dog when it was still too hot."

"OH NO! WHAT A DISASTER! IS MY HUMAN OKAY?" Concern in his voice, ignorance to Sans's light-hearted tone. How did he ever survive politics?

"yeah, gave him water. prince shot a pic of him chugging it. ask him for a peak the next time you see him." Giving up on the blueprint, Sans wrapped it up. He pulled open the tool drawer and pulled out a rubber band. The blueprint was bound and under his arm when he stepped out of the lab to greet his brother properly.

Papyrus's state dress was definitely a case of Asgore's compromise he'd been pushing for. No more did he don his battle body, with its well painted basketballs. After all, 'his battles now were of words, not of violence. And a battle of words needed a different kind of armor.' Where once was a well washed thing of beauty was a black human dress suit, black pants, with a clean white undershirt. The only accommodation Papyrus was allowed was the black tie with a very happy skull on it. That was tucked into the overcoat at all times, though, so only a few people knew that.

"WELCOME TO THE REST OF THE APARTMENT!" Papyrus announced as he stepped out. Sans grinned harder at his brother's enthusiasm. "AND WELCOME TO YOUR PIECE OF PAPER TOO!"

"heh. thanks. great to be here. it's a papercut above the rest." Sans joked. Papyrus's eyes bugged out. "thank you. much as i'd like to say i'll be here all week, i've got to go see someone real quick. can you hold down the fort?"

"ER... OKAY! I GUESS WE SHALL NOT BE MAKING DINNER TOGETHER TONIGHT THEN. A PITY... FOR YOU!" Papyrus let out three of his iconic 'Nyeh heh heh's. "WHOEVER YOU GO SEE, TELL THEM THAT THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AMBASSADOR OF THE MONSTERS SAYS 'HELLO!'"

"will do." Sans walked out of the study, and in a single step more, he vanished.

Alphys's place was nice. It was in the suburbs near the city of Ebott, a few blocks down the street from Asgore's house. Even in the waning dusk light, Sans could see the shrubs of the King of all Monsters home, trimmed to perfection. Just like the school in the city proper, except there he had a whole block to work with, and more restrictions. He did manage to fight for the hedge of Papyrus's face, though.

Alphys's was dorkier, and more macho all at once. He could see the backside of a poster on a window upstairs, and the light of a tv in a darker room downstairs. Otherwise, the building could have just as well been condemned with how dark the house was and uncared the grass had been. Sans knew a little something about uncared for anything. He stepped up to the door, grinning at the 'no punks allowed' sign. He pulled his free hand out of his pocket and knocked.

Tap-tap.

Sputtering and surprise resounded in the house. Shuffling. Eventually, a stocky and lizard-y figure about Sans's height opened the door with a robe thrown on hastily.

"Uh... H-hi there... W-what a surprise. At this hour. On a weeknight. W-without warning. What can I do for you Sans?" She asked, said, and greeted all at once.

"hey alphys. you busy?" He asked casually.

"Um..." Alphys turned back into in the house, and back to Sans. "Yes? C-can whatever it is wait until tomorrow? Or even the day after? Not that I don't want to help, I-I just... Kind of sort of... Am busy?"

"eh, okay." Sans answered casually, a complicit shrug added for good measure. He patted the blueprint in his arm. "i'm just going to leave this here with you. that sound good?"

"Uh... Sure?"

"great." He shoved the sheet into her hands. "if you get the chance, give it a once over. if not, oh well. it's just a little timed study anyway. let me know when you're free, we can both look at it." Sans turned on the heels of his slippers, and started to walk away. "tell undyne that papyrus said hey." He turned to walk away again, and stopped once again, turning back once again to face a still befuddled nerd. "also, papyrus says hey."

He got a call as soon as he stepped into his room about thirty seconds later. Caller id revealed it to be Undyne, tagged by a picture of her in her armor holding Alphys on her shoulder, just because she could. Impressive that she was already calling, since it hadn't even been a minute since he left Alphys's door. He slid the green bar over and put it on speaker.

"hey. sans here. except i'm not. leave a message after the-"

"I know that's you Sans! What the hell did you do?"

"nothing, probably. same as usual," he answered cheekily. He was a bit disappointed the leave-a-message bit didn't pan out.

"Real funny punk. One minute Alphys and I are snuggling hardcore! Hanging out, watching this anime ninja kid kick some serious ass! The next, she answers the door, comes back, sputters some apology, mentions your name, and disappears into her lab!" Something shattered on the other side of the phone.

"huh. sounds terrible. guess i'll just go take my doomsday device blueprints back from her. build it myself in the city."

The line went quiet for a moment.

"Sans, I _am_ a cop," Undyne deadpanned.

"and i'm the ambassador's brother and roommate. that sounds like cause for diplomatic immunity."

"Enough! Quit with your damn jokes, what did you really do?" She sounded pretty frustrated, like her scales had been peeled off.

"guess you got me. it wasn't a doomsday device. I only left her the blueprints to a doomsday clock of sorts," Sans answered. Undyne huffed on the other side of the phone. "wanted to build it myself, but you know how it is. like her chances of doing it more, since she has a sentient robot under her belt. not that mettaton would fit.."

"Seriously? What the hell?" Undyne was shouting. She probably thought he was still joking. It was about half the truth, though.

"yeah. i'm always serious about the end of the world. at least, that's what people tell me."

There was a groan. "Fine. I'll have to ask her then. She won't give me this crap." There was a click, and the line went dead.

That settled, Sans sat back on his bed once more. Not really anything more he could do now, since Alphys was busy. His coat didn't come off this time. He didn't even lay down before he fell asleep.

* * *

 **June 15, 2013**

 _Busy day today. Last of my finals are finally done. Chemistry is now a thing of the past. Suck it, Mrs. Williamson. H2-suck it! Turns out, temperature is how fast the atoms that make me up get the hell out of your class! And let's look at our thermometer... Yep, it turns out it's boiling!_

 _Okay, I have to be tired if I really just wrote that. Or bitter that I probably just barely did okay on the test itself. That line was awful, and I'm so damn glad no one will else ever read it._

 _As if that wasn't enough of a load off my chest, as of four hours ago the last of my papers have been officially been sent to Blackwell Academy. Last scholarship info, last minute updates to the portfolio, last absolutely everything. They've had my application and my parents financial information for months now, and now they have my transcript. Officially, it's out of my hands. Can't wait until I see the rejection letter, and can stop hoping beyond a hope that I don't suck._

 _To celebrate, my parents took me out for dinner. Not sure if it was really that much of an occasion. I think Dad just wanted to go to the Hard Rock Cafe down by the art museum. Dad loves his murder-ribs, and the music was definitely up to both of our standards. Mom... Mom tolerated us, though I suspect it's lucky that her eyes didn't roll out of her head. Too much nostalgic music grosses her out._

 _On the way out, though, we saw one of those monsters. Real as can be. I hadn't even thought about them in months, beyond when Dad has the news on. She was like... A spider? And a person? Six arms, two legs, and a bunch of eyes that stared into my very soul. She was selling donuts and cider around the corner from the Cafe. And she had actual spiders crawling all over her table, too... Ewwwwww ew ew ew!_

 _I wanted to keep walking, but my dad had to be brave. He went up to her, and started_ talking. _Mom and I got dragged along with him. And she talked back, with this creepy high pitched voice. And... She was almost human in how she acted. Told us how she moved out West with under some kind of Monster Expansion fund that the President pushed out. Dad asked her where she was staying, just trying to be neighborly, and you wouldn't believe where she was living._

 _Yeah. Home. Arcadia Bay._

 _There is a spider person living in my hometown. Apparently she wanted to be somewhere where her... Spider clan... Could live with being stepped on all the time. What a world. If I did get into Blackwell, would I ever see her? Or her spiders? :-|_

 _I wish I could say I would be cool with that, she seemed pretty okay. She did charge way too much for those donuts, though. But at the same time, um... Hello? SPIDER!_

 _Well, as is, I have to see her every time I open this page. Dad had been so excited to hear about home, he practically made me take a picture. It's... Not my best work. The lighting was awful, and I couldn't get a great angle with all the people walking by, and I think that got me more upset than everything else today did_ _ _combined_._

 _Phew, that was a lot of writing. I'm going to go pass out now. Night, night, sleep tight, and such._

In the corner of the page is a single photograph. A short, shy looking girl with light brown hair is standing woodenly in the foreground, her arm barely visible as she holds the camera out. A man and woman stand side by side on one end of her, barely poking their heads into the frame.

On the other end of the girl is another girl with periwinkle colored skin. She has several more eyes than the others, each with beady white irises staring into the camera. Her black hair is done up in pigtails, with little red bows holding them up. Her dress is a bright red, a perfect match to the bows in her hair. Most ominous, or perhaps most appealing would be the sly, perhaps even cat-like smile she had.

 **July 10, 2013**

 _I GOT ACCEPTED INTO BLACKWELL ACADEMY._

 _If words can dance this would be a rave. Even though I've never been to one. But who cares because I GOT INTO BLACKWELL ACADEMY, a unique and famous private school for seniors! NO KIDS ALLOWED! I didn't think I would be so excited, since it's not like I didn't used to live in the same town. But when I saw the first text from the Blackwell scholarship office, I could literally feel my pulse speed up._

 _I thought it was going to say "Sorry! Thanks for playing!" It took me a few seconds to read the whole thing. I guess I wanted to enjoy that last moment of blissful ignorance. And when I saw the first word, "Congratulations..." I think I screamed._

 _My mom cried, and my dad laughed. They're so weird. But they're happy and this means extra financial support because they don't have to pay anything to Blackwell. This means new clothes and if I can work it in, a new laptop._

 _Oh, and I have to keep telling myself in all caps I'M GOING TO BLACKWELL ACADEMY._

* * *

"H-hey Sans?" Even through the line's static, Alphys's concern was palpable.

"yes?" He'd had to step away from his cart to answer.

"Um... You still haven't told me what it is that this thing does. A-and there are a lot of... Um... Gauges? I-I was able to repurpose a printer for one part of it, but... Well, I can't figure out what it's supposed to be telling me."

"oh. do you want to know?" Hesitation on the other side of the line.

"Um... Would you actually tell me? All I know is you spooked Undyne when she called you back when we started. A D-doomday clock, I think? I mean, not that you would ever do anything bad, you're nice and all, but it-"

"it has you nervous. that's okay." Sans looked back by the cart. Two pairs of eyes were staring at him inquisitively. Really didn't feel like the time for an audience. He flashed the kids his iconic grin, and returned to his phone call. "think of it like a gps. or that google earth thing the humans came up with."

"Um... I'm not sure I understand." Her interruption wasn't appreciated, but also not unexpected.

"it's also like a clock, though," Sans continued without skipping a beat. "a clock tells time. google ogles the planet, and you can find where you are, right? but you can also look anywhere else, too. even places no one has ever been."

Alphys went silent on the line. Was his comparison working at all? It made perfect sense to him. How could he make it simpler, though.

"It keeps track of where we are in time?" She hazarded. Sans sighed. No, his metaphor didn't quite work yet.

"not really. that'd just be a clock. what we're making keeps track of what version of time we're in, and maps how many other possibilities exist."

"What? That sounds like w-we're playing with the multiverse. How is that... Sans, where did you get this blueprint?" She sounded exasperated. Sans visibly flinched at the question.

"found it in new home back underground." _And hid it under my house for years and year, bringing it with me up to the surface to lock it in a room I don't let anyone else in._ No need to tell her all of that.

"Well... Okay. That should give me a better idea of what I'm working with. It'd be easier if I could read all of it, though. Power costs for this thing are already looking a bit crazy." She still sounded flustered.

"couldn't you move it all and plug it into the core?" He hazarded.

"Without all the old safeguard in place? I-I mean, Ice Wolf isn't even keeping it cool anymore. Who even knows how little power it would take before it got too hot in there?"

Sans sighed. That was a good point. This was why it was a two person job. One he wasn't really sure why he started. Even so, he couldn't really stop since he dragged someone else into it. That'd be rude, and he wasn't in the business of being rude for rudeness sake.

"could you run it at your place, if nothing else was going?"

"Um... Probably not for long, even if we turned everything else off. And it'd be loud, too..."

"i could run it alone when it's done. you could take undyne out somewhere nice, on me."

"Oh, um... That sounds great!"

"doesn't it? just promise to bring something back for me. something greasy."

He ended the call there, not waiting for her to answer. He turned around back to the kids, who had been very obviously waiting patiently. No chance at all they were over there listening in. Especially not with the questions written all over their faces, or how Frisk was swaying back and forth whistling. Sans had tried to whistle before, but he lacked one of the most important components for it: lips.

"sorry about that. alphys needed to know stuff about the doomsday device we're making," Sans told them. Frisk sighed, clearly resigning himself to a lack of information.

"Golly, what kind of stuff?" Asriel's mechanical answer well practiced and devoid of much emotion.

"doomsday stuff. she still needs a lock of a boss monster's hair, the bottled up groans of a thousand puns, and a newt to stir the ingredients together." Diffuse, distract, deny.

"Aww, come on Sans," Frisk pleaded. "Can't you just 'humer-us?' He concluded with a heavy handed wink.

Sans snorted. "frisk, you're better than that. it hasn't been long enough yet for you to get away with that one again."

"So? Come on, please Sans? You know I'll just find out anyway. Alphys can't lie to us anymore," Frisk insisted. He did have a point there. Since coming out and telling the world about what happened in her lab, the Unroyal Scientist had gotten incredibly bad at keeping secrets. Or perhaps people had just gotten better at reading her and pushing her buttons.

"heh, fair enough," Sans responded with a shrug. He threw a trio of 'dogs onto the grill so they could start to cook. "depending on how it worked, i might have been telling you anyway."

"found a blueprint for a a device that keeps track of how many timelines exist. used to have one in the underground too, back when... well, before alphys was the royal scientist. the device was close to complete, only a few things missing. the main part was functioning before the project kicked the bucket. just before it could triangulate which one we were in. a sine of things to come, i suppose, and i'd cosine that statement." Silence. So trigonometry wasn't elementary school learning, then.

"So... Why now?" Asriel questioned. Concern in his voice as he flicked a glance at Frisk, who looked hurt. "I mean... It's not like there's anything left for him to go back to."

"Yeah... Sans, don't you trust me?" Yeah, that was hurt in his voice. Quite a bit of it, actually.

"i'd love to. thing is, no one else has what you have as far as i know. if I know when a timeline is supposed to turn itself around, maybe i could get you to not... or maybe you really never do reset again, and i sleep easier knowing it." He shrugged again. "only started because of an itch bad enough to keep me awake. yeah, that bad. best method of scratching was watching time go by, it turns out." The 'dogs were done, he put them in their buns, and handed two of them to the kids. "shift's over at five, if ya want to talk. tell tori i said hey."

The kids shared a glance, and said their goodbyes. It wasn't a particularly happy one. Perhaps he shouldn't have said anything? No, then Alphys would say something, and they'd be more upset with him. He can at least trust them with his discomfort, and his desire for a little control over his life.

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **Hey, author here. Wanted to make note of Frisk's gender real quick. I know the jury's out on how 'they' should be represented, and I'll probably get some people upset by making Frisk a boy. The main reason I, in a word, 'gendered' Frisk was because that was never going to be the focus of the story, and it would've been distracting if I had to keep using 'they' and 'them', not to mention dehumanizing. I know there are people out there who struggle with things like that, and I do respect your struggle. The thing is that I'm not here to make a statement, nor am I close enough to the issue in my life to be able to give it the respect it would deserve. I dare say that anything I could say would either be a copy of other people's work, or accidentally offensive. Thus, Frisk is a dude.**

 **If you're looking at this story, coming from my other brief escapade into Undertale, crossing it with Adventure Time, and thinking, "What gives?" The answer is simple: I lost interest in Adventure Time. I did not lose interest in Undertale. If you're here from World of Dragons, then don't worry. That's not dead. Just wrestling with some uncertainties there. I needed a break, and in general something different. This is also the first story I've written the word 'fuck' in, and it's been unbelievably cathartic not inventing PG swears.**

 **As for the last question I can answer: why? Well, I played through Life is Strange for the first time a couple of weeks ago, and thought... You know, what happens when you put two time travelers in a room together? One thing lead to another, and now goat bro is saved, monsters are freed, and Sans is rebuilding a DT based device. I started making notes eight days ago. I started this chapter six days ago, and started my editing-rounds two days ago. Might be a few kinks to work out with how this works out down the line, but I'm feeling good about this.**

 **Some of your other questions will find their answers _In Time_ (Eyyy), whilst others don't need answers.**


	2. Contrast

**Had to rewrite the first scene a few times to make it less telling, more showing. I mean, I had this crazy machine built, might as well actually see it instead of just explain it. The machine itself is loosely based on Undertale canon, though it is never shown. Only really mentioned once, and most of us were probably furiously tabbing through the dialogue at that point.**

* * *

 **August 18, 2013**

 _So this is it. I'm leaving Seattle to go back to Arcadia Bay. Usually people go to the High School closest to home. I suppose I am too, I just haven't lived there for 5 years. Out of all the best photography programs in the world, I choose to go to the smallest, back in a town I was excited about leaving._

 _Maybe I wanted to come back all along, just to see if Chloe and I are still even friends. But I do wish Chloe could have moved to Seattle... That city was made for her. When we would play pirates in our rooms and in the woods, it seemed like Seattle was that fabled faraway island of treasure and adventure that we were always seeking. With coffee shops._

 _But Seattle wasn't like a fable. Au Contraire. Now Blackwell Academy seems more exotic to me than any other place in the world. To study photography under Mark Jefferson... SIGH. Insert hearts and flowers. Plus there will be cool diverse students from everywhere. It won't be like my high school now... I never really found my groove with my classmates. (Or boys...) I'm lucky I have a couple great friends here. But it's time to ship out._

 _So maybe Arcadia Bay will actually turn out to be the island of treasure and adventure I've been looking for. I mean, it does have spider people now. Seattle doesn't have spider people. Or is it just one spider person and a bunch of spiders?_

 _This is sounding less romantic by the second._

* * *

Bzzt.

Bzzt.

Bzzt.

"frisk. buddy. answer the phone? it's important."

Click.

His cell had been ringing every few minutes for the past hour. Sans would leave a message, asking him to pick up. If it was so important, Frisk figured Sans would just appear in front of his room and pop on in. Crack a joke, and pretend he didn't say he didn't trust him to keep his promise. He knew how strongly Sans felt about his own promises. Shuddered to remember. 'You'd be dead where you stand.'

You remember him proving it in spite your best efforts not to recall.

Every time the phone rang, Asriel's expression drooped a bit as he not-so-inconspicuously glanced at the phone.

"Asriel, hold still," Frisk ordered once more. Asriel obeyed immediately like the good Prince he wanted to be. Frisk looked over his paper at his model again, then back at the paper. It was just a sketch, and not a very good one at that. He wasn't adding any color, nor even the shading of the evening sun that was coloring their room a shade of orange. Differentiating different shades was beyond him, and their art teacher wasn't doing much to help there. She was happy with them throwing paint cans at the paper and calling it art. It works in a lot of places in the real art world these day, from what you've read. She was nice though, and that stayed consistent every time he met her, so he felt bad thinking negatively of her.

Asriel was propped up on a short stool, sitting at an angle facing slightly to Frisk's right. It was Summer, so they didn't need to prove to the world that they were kids. Instead of stripes, Asriel had a simple green polo on, with a pocket protector of all things. And no stripes. In theory there was a collar on it too, perfectly fixed. It wasn't visible at the moment since, for the picture, Asriel wanted to show off his new scarf. Silken and dyed like a rainbow. It was pretty cool, and Frisk had said as much. It was hardly the weather for it though, and they didn't have enough fans in the house to keep him from sweating under it.

Frisk refused to allow him to change. The excuse he'd given was that it's ruin his focus, and he'd have to restart all over again. Asriel definitely didn't want that, now did he? It might have been a teeny tiny fib. Really, Asriel looked adorable in that scarf. He'd tell him as much later, when the drawing was done. He'd also admit he was lying about needing him to keep the scarf on. It was the perfect plan, with no possible repercussions that wouldn't be absolutely worth it.

A nagging voice in your head reminds you that that is cruel, and you should be ashamed of your debauchery.

It also tells you started the right ear is too low.

Sure enough, he had drawn Asriel's right ear too low. Wrong start, wrong length, and with an awkward scaling compared to the rest of the sketch. It was still adequately fluffy, but it wasn't perfect. Frisk scratched it out passionately, and started on the ear again. He could hear Asriel's groan as he restarted part of the sketch.

Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.

"okay. you're not going to answer. guess i did upset you. that _would_ explain why you've been getting your 'dogs elsewhere, anyway. talk to you in a bit."

Click.

There were two knocks on the door, right on cue. Frisk dragged his hand down his face in exaggerated exasperation. Asriel, still stiff as he could be, looked at him curiously.

"Should we...?"

"Answer him? Yeah. If Sans thinks it's this important we'd better," Frisk answered preemptively. He flipped a page over his current work on the sketch pad and set it aside. Asriel seemed relieved to be allowed to move again, if nothing else. He threw his scarf off, straight onto his own bed, and stood up.

By the time they got to the front door, Mom had already answered it. In a sense. She hadn't opened the door yet. She was standing there, looking regal in her robe. No need to dress like a teacher over the summer, after all. The regality was only besmirched by the mischievous grin on her face.

"Who's there?" She singsonged.

"etch."

I have heard this one before.

Mom was already smirking when she asked, "Etch who?"

"bless you."

Frisk smiled at the joke. Asriel groaned. Mom laughed hysterically. So paralyzed by her mirth was she that Frisk got to the door and opened it before she could breathe again. Sans was standing there wearing his big grin on his face, and his patented hoodie, shorts, slippers on his everywhere else.

"hey kid. i heard tori's coming down with a cold. hope you don't catch it too." That solicited a few more laughs, even from Asriel and especially from Mom. Enough that Frisk forgot he was supposed to be mad at Sans for a moment. "there's that smile. nicer than mine."

"Don't just stand there, Sans. Come on in. I'm finishing up a snail pie right now, and I know we'll have enough if you want to join us," Mom offered, her voice once again her own. Sans considered this for a moment. He looked at Frisk once, who was still torn between anger and laughter, and shrugged.

"i guess i can make room in my busy schedule for it," he joked. Mom just rolled her eyes at that one. She never laughed at Sans's self-deprecation. They were the only jokes that never really struck home for her when coming from Sans. Not if they couldn't be turned into a pun, that was. Then they were hilarious again.

"Good. It shouldn't take more than a moment. Why don't you wait at the table?"

They followed her into the dining room that doubled as a living room. She left them in there for the kitchen one room over. The fusion of a dining room and living room was comfortable, resembling Mom's house back in Home. There were differences, though. The couch against the wall by the door, for example, and the pretty nice flat tv hung above the fireplace. Mom had also refused to get proper carpeting, on the grounds that Boss Monsters shed. The hard wood wasn't bad, and it was certainly easier to clean.

As soon as Frisk's bottom touched his seat, a familiar gaseous sound emitted through the room. The lump underneath him sunk as the whoopee cushion deflated further. Asriel, who hadn't sat down yet, checked his own seat, feeling around with his hand. He sat down cautiously. It did nothing to save him from a similar fate. They both shot silent, bemused glances at the skeleton. It was turning out to be really, really hard for Frisk to stay mad at Sans. Especially for something he said a month ago.

The three of them hadn't even had time to get situated and stare at each other awkwardly before Mom returned. Her famous -or infamous, depending on who you asked- snail pie was balanced delicately in her palms. As it was laid out, it was evident the pie already looked cut into eight even slices. Two for each of them. Frisk suspected Asriel would be getting a third slice, given that his own stomach was already pleading for MERCY.

I would not succumb to your fears. Stomach. I will FIGHT him for you. Should the opportunity arise it would be much simpler.

Frisk ignored the jokey threat. Four plates were set out for each of them, a single slice of snail murder laying on top of it. An unfair way of looking at it, but Frisk really struggled to find the appeal in eating snails. With a deep breath, Frisk cut off a bit of the tip, and began the slow grind through the pie. It was no Cinnamon-Butterscotch, that was for sure. He'd be amiss if he didn't allow his Mom to make it, especially looking at how fast Asriel was scarfing it down.

Sans, for his part, didn't look sure how to handle it. Amazing, given his tendency to make food disappear. What was going on in his head, Frisk wondered, that pie was visibly giving him trouble. Mom seemed to be picking up on this as well.

"Sans, is something the matter?" She asked. He returned his ubiquitous smile.

"nah. trying to think of how i should escar-go at this dessert." He finished with a wink, and Mom chuckled. Sans glanced over at Frisk, who was trying not to laugh. Asriel looked displeased, despite how gleefully stuffed his snout was. We've ruined bad jokes for him forever.

"That said," Mom continued with a smile fresh on her face, "you normally give me a bit more warning than this before you show up out of the blue. Is there something you needed?"

Asriel and Frisk shared a glance. They weren't going to say anything.

"yeah, you could say that. mind if i borrow the kids for a little while? alphys and i have been working on something, and i think they'll find it pretty neat," San said. When Mom gave him a look, he quickly added, "if they have the time for it, that is."

"They do have a curfew, Sans," Mom gently reminded him.

You chuckle on the inside, knowing that has never stopped you before. Wait, you don't? Oh, that's just me. My mistake.

"i know, but it's summer. unless they have an appointment they don't have anyplace to be. it won't take long. believe it or not, i-"

"You know a shortcut, I know," Mom finished for him. "But-"

"Mom, I handled the Underground alone already," Frisk interrupted as patiently and reassuringly as he could. Far more than once, as well. He'd lost track of how many times he'd been through there. Whilst that would help his case, he'd never told her about that. Didn't know if he ever could. The only people he had told had been Sans and Asriel. At most, Alphys and Asgore may have figured out a out his Resets as well. "I can handle Sans's 'something neat.' We won't get into any trouble we couldn't get out of."

A dangerous gamble, given her matriarchal authority. He really didn't want to have to redo any of his drawing, and his most recent save had been back when he started that a few hours ago. That, and the generally questionable morality of taking back time. He'd do it if things got bad enough, but he'd rather not for something this trivial.

Luckily, it didn't seem like it'd be necessary. Mom hesitantly sat back in her chair and sighed.

"Okay. I'll clean up here, you can run ahead. Get them back here before eight."

"nine it is," Sans said with a wink. Mom couldn't help but emit an amused hum. She wagged her finger scoldingly at the skeleton, but he waved it off. "Yeah, eight should be fine."

Before they left, Mom gave both of the kids a gently firm hug, and hung on a little longer than would normally be considered enough. She always did this when they left, holding them like if she let go they would disappear. Frisk didn't mind, free hugs were free hugs.

"You be good for Sans, do not get into trouble while I'm not there with you," she told Asriel as she held him.

"Of course not, Mom." Asriel had to wriggle out of the hug he got, pushing away from Mom with a light shove. "I'll have Frisk and Sans with me."

"Of course you will. As your mother, I'm just meant to worry is all."

With one last reminder to Sans to keep an eye socket on the kids, Mom dragged her fluffy feet into the kitchen with dishes in hand. Frisk and Asriel followed Sans out the door, and took a step out. Imagine their surprise when they were still on the pavement, in front of their own house.

It was a sweet little house they lived in too. It was a single story of wood, painted the same purple that the Ruins were. That was for Mom's comfort, Frisk thought. Given how many years she had spent there. Alone. The kids had their own personal touches on the outside. The chalk drawing Frisk had made of a platypus on the walkway up. A star decoration that hung on the door, courtesy of Asriel.

And, of course, the bed of golden flowers they had been caring for together in front of the porch. Asgore had helped them with growing it for the first two weeks, with Mom's reluctant permission. That was Frisk's favorite part. The yellow of the flowers went really well with the purple of the house. The green of their lawn didn't quite tie the picture together, but that didn't stop Asriel from hanging that picture of the house in their room, a nice frame around it. He was really proud of that shot.

 _Nothing to say to that?_

Nothing which I have yet to say.

"sorry kids, we're taking the long way today," Sans apologized as they stepped outside. He suddenly looked glum. "we... need to talk. without alphys there. she doesn't know a whole lot about what we're doing. at least, nothing i haven't let her know."

Frisk nodded seriously. Asriel sighed. They stepped off the porch and started their trek through the suburbs they called home.

"we finished that machine i told you about," Sans started. "it, uh... took a lot of work. had to crank it up." A pause. "well, we're serious today. fair enough. means i don't have to bleat around the bush." He turned and shot a wink in Asriel's direction.

That one got a reaction. Frisk had to stop for a moment, and took his laughter out on the nearest tree he could reach. Asriel, meanwhile, sent his death glare in the skeleton's direction. A promise of retribution from the God of Hyperdeath. Not that Sans saw it, he was admiring his joke's effects through hearing.

"anyway, it took a few weeks, but we think we found the timeline we're in right now. loops within it match up with what you've told me, frisk, and with my own inferences. our current time-cluster-"

"Time-cluster?" Frisk interrupted.

"well, it's certainly not a line anymore," Sans answered. "i'll show you when we get there. we have pictures."

They were passing by Napstablook's house out that moment. Currently vacant, given the ghost was out on tour with his cousin. For all the money the ghost had to have now, being not-quite-as-famous-but-still-famous as Mettaton, it was still an admittedly pathetic house. Maybe that was what made the ghost comfortable. Something that looked like garbage.

"anyway, we found our cluster. and things look... pretty good on it for a while." Sans said. "but then... weird things happen. loops that don't look like any others we can see."

"What do you mean?" Asriel asked. Sans remained silent. A little desperately, Asriel asked again, "Sans, what do you mean?"

"that's just it. i don't know what i mean. you'll have to see it." The three of them stepped behind a tree, and vanished.

Alphys's door was inches away now, and Asriel didn't catch on that they had gone through a shortcut. He walked right into the door.

"Ow," he mumbled. He was rubbing his snout, a little annoyed.

"sorry kid. probably should have warned you," Sans said genuinely. It didn't last very long. "i a-door my surprises, though."

Asriel groaned. Frisk gave him a supportive pat on the back. Sans knocked on the door, two rhythmic knocks.

"Coming!" Alphys's voice came. After a moment, and far much too effort to turn the last lock. When the door opened, Alphys was standing there wearing a newer lab coat, covered in what looked like oil and general gunk. The little Pikachu badge looked ready to suffocate. "Sans, F-frisk." After a pause, she noticed Asriel still rubbing his snout. Her features twisted into her 'I did an awkward' face as she hastily added "and Asriel! Hello to you... too?"

"Hi." The prince returned monotonously.

With all of the grace of an eagle. Piloting a blimp.

 _Not cool. That's not even your joke. Actually, you didn't even use it right._

I would think of something better were we not so fatigued. You should consider resting properly.

 _But then who's going to watch our late night cartoons?_

Alphys will.

"hey alphys. wanted to show the kids our little project. undyne's still out, right?" Sans asked.

"Um... Yeah. She is. She still doesn't like you sneaking in when she's not home, though..."

"that's okay, it's not sneaking if you let me in."

"A-and she still hates this machine, too. Especially since she... you know, hasn't been told what it does. And it really upped last month's power bill..."

"Come on, Alphys. I wanna see," Frisk piped up. Alphys stared at him blankly, contemplating her answer. _Don't give her that time._ "You won't even have to turn it on. Just tell me what the pieces do. Sans told me you have pictures, too, so we can look at those."

Alphys still looked hesitant. Sans wasn't stepping in to help because he had a chance to not do work, and Frisk knew Asriel would probably not step in himself. That left him to push the issue when Alphys said "I d-don't know. Sans, are you...?"

"For me?" Frisk asked. He cupped his hands together, and looked up at her with the cutest smile he could muster. He could practically feel Asriel choking down laughter. Not Frisk's fault he was adorable, though. Only what he did with it.

"Oh alright," Alphys broke. "I'm not really sure why Sans wants to..." She paused mid sentence. Blinked twice. Stared dead into Frisk's cute, lovable smile. And there was that awkward smile again. "A-anyway. I'm going to go... Um... Elsewhere?"

Frisk deflated a bit. He'd wanted Alphys to show them the machine, too. Odds were, she'd rant at them about the machine before catching herself, apologizing, and shutting down hard for a while. That hadn't changed yet, almost five months free of the Underground. Not everything about his final run had to be perfect though. It just needed to have everyone there.

Are you certain that we-

"Aw, can't you help too?" Asriel asked, to Frisk's surprise. "I mean, do you really think Sans wants to explain all of it alone?"

Sans shrugged noncommittally. "it's true, alphys. i could use the support. just until the mechanical part is out of the way, if you don't want to stick around."

"N-no, it's not that... It's, uh..." Sweat dripped down her face. Which was odd, given she was reptilian. Their science teacher said they shouldn't sweat. Frisk blamed magic and decided to move on. It was probably the same reason Sans and Papyrus sweat when they got nervous or tired. Then she sighed again.

Alphys led them through the house apprehensively. Her fingers were circling each other in front of her, she was staring dead ahead, and she was just generally distant. Was she okay? Actually, was that her 'do I ask or don't I' face. It was a face he should have recognized earlier.

"Whatcha thinking about?" He prompted. She looked startled.

"Um... I... Uh, Frisk? Can I ask you something weird?" She sounded really nervous about this.

"Always, Alphys," he answered amiably.

"Um... Well, do you- well, can you err...?" Oh. That question.

She has been constructing a mechanism with which she can read timelines. She has studied Determination more than we have used it, an impressive quantity in and of itself. She is an admittedly intelligent person. It goes beyond saying she can at least make assumptions about the... Possibilities.

"Yes, I am a time traveler," Frisk answered casually. He heard Asriel miss a step behind him. Alphys stopped mid step, her foot suspended in the air. Sans grin grew a bit wider.

"it's true," the skeleton added. "he knew my time traveler passwords and everything."

Her foot fell to the ground.

"Oh. Oh my gosh," she mumbled. "That explains so much. That's how you solved the tile maze, isn't it?"

Frisk shrugged, emulating Sans's nonchalance. Deep down, he was loathe to be reminded of that thing. He hated, hated, HATED it. He didn't use that word lightly either. It was a word he reserved for only the cruelest things he had ever experienced. But he had done everything else in the Underground at that point, and he was on his way to bring back the dead. He could damn well finish the puzzle.

It so heartens me that you have grown past accusing me of forcing such a strong feeling on you.

He'd passed out at the MTT Resort immediately afterwards, not even stopping to hang out with Sans out front. Good thing the skeleton was willing to wait. Sans knew a thing or two about someone needing sleep. Or just wanting it. They caught up after his nap, which had for once been worth the price of admission.

"And the quiz... Why you pressed Mettaton's button before I called you... How you alway knew just what to do and say to avoid hurting anyone..." Her pupils shrunk to a speck of her eyeballs. "You knew I'd shout about making out with Undyne, didn't you?"

Frisk snickered. "It's worked every time."

Asriel had to laugh at that as well. He'd been there too, Frisk knew. In a sense, anyway, given that who he was then and now were very different people.

Alphys's entire being turned red.

"well, guess you know now then. it's about time they told someone else," Sans added. "now they've been dying to see this cluster of time he's put us in. could we?"

Yellow returned to her scales and they continued through the house. Down the hallway. Alphys opened a door to reveal the basement steps. She flicked a switch on, lighting their way down. Frisk was not even surprised to find the machine wasn't at the bottom of the steps, in the large room that made up the basement.

A secret door, perhaps? Was it an elevator, or was it just another room over? An elevator would be very much in character for Alphys, but maybe she wanted to mix it up this time. It's also only been just under half a year, she couldn't possible have dug that far into the earth to build a new lab.

As the suspense kept Frisk guessing, Alphys started to fiddle around with a poster on the wall. Some anime that she hadn't gotten to share with him yet, he presumed. He honestly hadn't found much time to hang out with Alphys this time, and that made him kind of sad. He always tried to give his favorite monsters his time if he could, but the fact was he just hadn't gotten the chance. Homework, Asriel, and his newly found penchant for drawing had been eating up a lot of his time.

Frustrated by her own fiddling, Alphys just pulled the poster down, revealing a blank brick wall! Wow! Except one of the bricks were obviously jutting out of the wall. She pressed that one in. The house shook a bit as one of the walls began to slide open. And then another. The floor opened up beside Alphys as well, and it did so again in the middle of the room.

In half a minute, machines and tables were pushed out these tables on platforms. Sleek blue metal sheets, covered in unpowered gauges, graphs, and lights. And was that a printer at that end? Frisk had one just like it.

"T-there we go!" Alphys cheered. "Finally fixed that p-problem in the presentation."

"Woah," Asriel whispered.

"So, uh... what do you think?" Alphys asked nervously. "About the reveal! Not the uh... I haven't explained the machine yet."

"I was expecting another elevator," Frisk admitted, gaping. With a smile he shot her two enthusiastic thumbs up. "That was awesome!"

Red creeped onto Alphys's face, and underneath her expected denial was an actual hint of pride. _One day, Undyne will have her believing she's awesome. At least she's accepting compliments._

"glad you got that working," Sans said. "it wouldn't have really convey-ored your ability if it didn't. as is, it belted it from the rooftops. just kind of echoed down here."

Sans earned his light chuckle, and then Alphys got to explaining the machine proper. They wouldn't be running it at all, as it wasn't necessary and apparently very expensive. The 'data' they've received would be presented to them at the end of her tour. Given that she now knew the nature of why Sans was even looking at timelines, she would even be joining them as they talked.

"The gauges all tell us something about how the machine is running," she'd said. "Like this one tells us how much power we're using, with the picture of the sock being too much, and the skull here in the middle being just enough." She pointed to another gauge, this one much larger. "This one tells us how much... well, Determination a shift in time took."

"How about this one?" Frisk asked, pointing at one at random, though it did look a bit tacked on. Mostly he was asking just to appear engaged. Alphys was clearly excited to talk about machines, but his elementary level science know-how was inhibiting his own comprehension of what she was saying. He did care about what she was saying, but the build up to what it all meant was important.

It had been impressed upon me that details mattered somehow.

"Oh, that one? Let me... Oh yeah! That one's hooked up to the microwave." She pointed a thumb across the room. On the wall was, in fact, a microwave. "I... Uh... I might have let my noodles get cold once or twice working on this. I sort of, maybe wanted to not do that again?"

From what he could gather, the bar monitors were readings of how much 'time travel' activity they were reading in a certain timeline. His little Saves and Loads. A green/red bar in the middle of them somehow told them how big of a jump was made. The more red there was, the closer they went to what they were calling point 'Zero'.

"it's like how there's temperature's below zero. sure, they're there and going there is rough, but it's not something you normally need to worry about here," he'd said during his interjection. Something about the casual way he brushed off Frisk's concern was off-putting.

"And how do you know you're looking at different timelines?" Asriel asked.

"Well, that's what those switches over there are," Alphys answered. "It's... Um, like..."

"ones and zeroes, kids," Sans answered for her.

"Well that's just vague enough to explain nothing and still make sense," Asriel snarked. Frisk folded his arms and stared down the Prince in a silently scold. Asriel wilted a bit under the glare.

What a Flowey thing for him to say. Would you not agree Frisk?

 _I'll stare you down too. Behave._

A resonance of mock fear tickled the brim of his imagination for an instant. The room was a little quiet, and it seemed like the two in charge of their machine tour had hit a pause.

"You'd said there were pictures. Can we see them?" Frisk asked.

"yeah, i did promise pictures," Sans admitted. He gesture the kids towards a mostly empty table off to the side of the room. "hey alphys, bring out the important ones?"

With a start, Alphys stepped to the desk with the printer on it. She opened a drawer, revealing rows and rows of files. She thumbed through them, stopping on one. Not because it was the right one, but she had somehow gotten ketchup on her finger. She sent a baffled stare at Sans, who just returned his smile. With a shake of her head, and her thumb, she dug back through the files. With an 'Ah-hah!' she pulled out the one she was looking for. She paused a second, and then grabbed a second file as well, seemingly at random.

"Alright, this one," she started holding up the second folder she'd grabbed, "contains what most of the timelines look like." She put it down on the desk and flipped it open. On the top of the stack was a sheet of paper, with a bubble that had the word 'Zero' on it, and a line going to the right straight off the page. Alphys picked up this first sheet, and the one under it raised with it. As it turned out, they were all one long paper taped together.

The line going to the right didn't stay singular for long. The first time it hit a black dot, the line split. One line was colored in red and the other was blue. Following the red line, Frisk found that it looped back to the divergent point. _That's me saving and loading_

What else could it be.

He traced the blue line to another divergent point. Three lines came off of this one, two red and one blue. One of the red lines returned almost immediately, whilst the other one took a while. It did come back eventually, and that's when he followed the blue line. The lead to another divergent point, more red lines and one more blue line. None of the red lines ever had any splits, given that he couldn't have more than one save.

That meant the blue lines were when he just let time go forward. The black dots were when he saved. The red loops were as far as he got on any given go, either because he died or he just wanted to retry something. On this particular timeline, he clearly had known what he was doing. He only had a few slip-ups here and there. Nothing drastic.

At least, not until about two-thirds into the line when a new bubble came in attached by a red line, labeled 'Anomaly 1.' It diverted into about thirty red lines, which crossed into eachother, around each other, and one even just went off the bottom of the page. It started again at the top, and went straight into the bubble. It was like a tangle of roots and vines. Frisk looked up at Asriel, who was staring blankly at the bubble and its offshoots.

"This one's in almost every single file, but it's never exactly the same," Alphys spoke up. "I have no idea what causes it."

 _It's for the better that you never do._

The blue line that led past 'Anomaly 1' actually led to another bubble not too far ahead of it, this one labeled 'Anomaly 2'. The break-off points from this one were more structural, and far less chaotic. Here, the red lines actually hit black dots, which extended into blue and red. Eventually, they all connected at one point, which led the way forward in blue ink. It was a fair guess as to what was happening there. Asriel looked sick to his stomach just seeing it.

"you okay, Asriel?" Sans asked suddenly.

"Huh? Uh, yeah. Great," he said, sounding anything but great. He clearly knew it too. "Golly, thanks for asking, though."

I recommend you pet his ears. Asriel would be my sibling. Wasting his... Resentment on his follies. You are to cheer him for me. Partner.*

 _Say no more, I'm on it._

He reached over to his brot - to Asriel! - and started to gently caress his ears. Frisk was honestly a bit surprised that he didn't jump away at the touch. Honestly, Frisk wasn't sure if he was even noticed... No, now he was leaning into it.

"Aww, that's adorable." Alphys commented. This seemed to bring Asriel back to his senses, as the boss monster looked at Frisk and seemed to realize what was happening.

"Eww! Frisk!" He shouted accusingly. Frisk just shrugged at him smugly, adding a playful wink at the end of it.

Ah. The boss monster. Truly the most tsundere of plants.

"Sorry, Asriel. I just remembered you have soft ears. I didn't hear you objecting until Alphys said something," the human teased.

They returned their attention to the timeline before them, with Asriel too embarrassed to be lost in his self-loathing for the moment. After the 'Anomaly 2' bubble, things calmed down a bunch for a while. There were another three, four sheets added on to the end with very few if any splits on them. At the end of the fourth sheet, there was one last bubble that said 'Fin' inside of it. That had to be a Reset.

"And most of them look like this one?" Frisk asked. Sans nodded.

"yeah. only two don't. you uh... you can guess what one is." Sans. Do not speak as if I am not here. It is rude. Or am I even here? "the other is the one we have right here in front of us. it'll throw you for a loop," Sans said, emphasizing the word loop. Asriel groaned, Frisk laughed, Alphys let out a chuckle. The voice in Frisk's head even sent some amusement his way.

The first timeline they'd read was folded up and put back in its folder. Alphys put it away as the kids dove into the second one.

The first thing that Frisk noticed were two purple lines that extended before point Zero. That was odd. Other than that, it was playing out fairly similarly to the first one they had looked at so far. At one point, there was a ton of red lines that didn't make it far before looping back. Frisk's eye twitched. He could guess what happened there. It was a tad too far away from Anomaly 1 to be anything to do with Asgore. _Dag-gone flibbet flabbet tile maze._

Oh no. Such language from one once so innocent. I shall be tattling to mother about this.

There was the anomaly bubbles, with all of their eccentricities and retries. As with the last timeline, the divergences slowed down for a while. This line was longer than the last though, so much so that they had to fold up the start of the timeline to open the rest. After about twelve sheets of pretty much nothing, with two lines of purple on either end of the main line they were following, there was a zig-zag line that was simply labeled 'Fall.'

And suddenly, Frisk understood why things were complicated about this time-cluster. A flurry of red and blue lines overtook the pages out of no where. Even more prominent were those colors disappearing all together, being replaced by purple. The purple lines were incredibly hard to follow. Sometimes they were easy, and just looped back like a red line. Other times, they looped back upon themselves, as though the timeline were rushing forward.

After the forth or fifth page of data, it got especially crazy. That's where they found the purple line that went before point 'Zero.' Something happens that lets the timeline get especially hectic. From there on the tangents got so extreme that Frisk could barely find the familiar red and blue lines. The purple tangents would extend pages upon pages, with little loops that barely branched off at all, only to return to a single point. Then it would beeline back to the specific point in time as a different branch. And then it would loop back and return to the original timeline like nothing had happened, or just barely off of it.

You feel your brain melting from overuse.

"so, uh... i wasn't joking about the time-cluster thing," Sans said, drinking in the shock on Frisk's expression.

"I'm... What," Frisk said. In his head, it was spelled 'wut' because what. This didn't make any sense. He certainly couldn't do this. What did this mean.

"you have no idea how this is happening?" Sans asked.

"No. None at all," Frisk whispered. This was terrifying. No way around it. "How did you draw this?"

"Part of it was the machine. A lot of it was by hand," Alphys chimed in, cutting off a surely clever response from Sans. "After the first week, I found a way to hook up the readings to the printer. Made the red and blue a lot easier. The purple..."

"it was all by hand," Sans chimed in tiredly. "a lot of it is just guess work, after those two big backwards loops."

Frisk nodded woodenly. He looked over to Asriel, who's eyes were locked onto to him and drowning him in concern. Frisk looked back down at the paper.

"it does end," Sans said solemnly. He moved to the end of the table and rolls up the sheets. There are four splits here. One line hits a bubble, labeled 'Unknown.' Two of the lines loop back to where the purple lines start cropping up, one red and the other purple. The last line just ends in the middle of the sheet. No loop, no anything.

"Sans... What is that one?" Frisk asks nervously. The impossible happens in that moment. First Sans hesitates. Then his mouth becomes a line.

"I don't know, bud. i've only got a guess. it appears in one other place, but that point was never reached."

Frisk. You are aware of what he is referring to. Are you not? The voice was practically singing. Just say my name.

 _Shut up_ Chara, _really not in the mood. We both know you're better than that now anyway._

The only response he got was a devilish humming in the back of his skull. It didn't even make him flinch.

"Sans, how could this happen?" Frisk asked. "How can this happen again?"

"buddy... i don't think it's you," Sans answered wistfully.

"Then... How?" Frisk demanded. Frisk? Are you crying? "I can't... I would never... Never again, I promised Sans, never stupid again-."

"Easy there, Frisk," Asriel said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "Deep breath. In. Out. Golly, if you aren't going to give me a heart attack." Frisk snorted ruefully at Asriel's comment. "Heh, you can respond a sick joke. Who'd have thought?"

Sans sighed. "kids, i'm sorry to show you this. didn't really want to at all, but... you deserve to know. and if there is a way we can push the timeline towards that good ending, i figured you'd be the best for the job."

Frisk nodded weakly, leaning onto his not-brother's shoulder for support. So what did that mean, he had to be the superhero again? Save the world, again? Struggle to preserve everyone's Hopes and Dreams, and get a new ending that was even better than the best? That was so exhausting last time.

"How long?" Frisk asked. When Sans gave him a blank stare, he realized it wasn't clear what he was even asking. "Until the purple lines start. How long?"

"well... somewhere in the first few weeks of fall. early october, most likely," Sans answered.

"Um... If I could?" Alphys piped up. Frisk had forgotten she was even in the room, she had gotten so quiet. Now she has everyone's attention. "I, uh... I think I found a way to find out where it's happening. It shouldn't take long, a-and it won't even get me in trouble with the power company! Again."

"How?" Frisk asked curiously.

"Well, you see... Um, from what I understand, your time travel powers come from an excess of... Well, determination. Greater than anyone else in the world, probably," she said. "But you don't really have an excessive amount of any of the other most powerful human virtues."

"Huh?" Asriel questioned. "I thought Determination was the only one with any power."

"We, uh, never proved that?" Alphys said. "I mean, it's the only one we have concrete proof for. But, what if someone had so much, say, Justice in their soul? More than anyone else? Or Kindness? Or even an excessive mix of two virtues?"

They all looked at her blankly.

"Um... I mean, maybe the others do have powers. And if someone has enough Determination in them, and an excess of another virtue, maybe the powers would mix somehow? Human Souls are pretty powerful."

"that's quite the thought," Sans commented. "but, uh, you've lost even me. not to mention the kids."

Alphys looked confused for a second. She then realized Frisk's mouth was hanging open and he was squinting at her with the his head tilted sideways. He imagined Asriel was in a similar place. She turned a beat red color as she tried to work out how to elaborate for elementary school students.

"Um... I'm going look for certain signals in the time cluster," she said. "When I find one that matches the, uh, purple lines, I'm going to then look for the signal in and on the world. I have my ways."

What the fuck?

 _Language_

Oh. Will you be informing mother of my... Transgression, I wonder. Mother has oh so few options these days for me. Would she... Scold me? Harm me? No. Because she would be doing it to you.

Frisk nodded woodenly. The conversation seemed to be over. He had nothing to add without just repeating Chara's rude insertion into his train of thought, hitch-hiking like a hobo. He glanced back at the crazy timeline they had set out before them. Now that shock was gone, he wanted to think of how he would actually do this when they found the source.

"Hey, Alphys? Can I ask you something?" Asriel suddenly spoke up, sounding a bit timid.

"Uh, okay?" She agreed.

"What's the machine's name?" He received silence as an answer. And looks of confusion. "I mean, it does a heck of a lot, it's gotta have a cool name right?"

"Um, I haven't actually-"

"ya, it has a name. came up with it myself," Sans spoke up. And then he didn't immediately say what it was. This meant they were on the crash course for a bad joke, and Frisk could feel Asriel tense up as he realized it.

"Well what is it?" Frisk prompted in his place, a goofy smirk on his face.

"it's the plot device." He said. Silence. "um, you know. cuz it plots timelines."

The room broke into hysterics. Or maybe that was just Frisk, rolling on the floor and drowning out even the idea of noise. Even Chara's laughter was but a shadow. It was nice, forgetting the impending possibility of doom that was edging nearer and nearer that he was going to have to stop.

Okay, Frisk. you can stop now. I implore you. You're embarrassing both of us... Partner?

It was a mark less... humorous than you are making it .

You are worse than Mom beyond any doubt.

Frisk?

* * *

 **August 25, 2013**

 _Shit is krazy here. I didn't realize how much crap I had to pack until I had to pack all my crap. Mom and Dad are gettin' a little too excited I'm clearing out my room. Tho I caught my mom crying when she was packing my shirts._

 _That made me want to cry like a little girl. And never leave Seattle. So instead of packing, I feel like burning all my clothes, then just raiding a thrift store to build up a new Max wardrobe over my junior year. Not that I even have an old Max wardrobe._

 _Nobody will know me except for Chloe, and who knows how different we are now. So I can cut my hair, get a tat and some piercings... Maybe date a cute foreign exchange artiste from Paris or Rome. I can do anything. Until I get busted._

 _And there will be so many supercool chances for my photography to get exposed! Thinking about that is when I get scared, but excited. And then I don't feel like crying at all. I get tingles down my arms, sensing the universe opening up for me. I can't wait to leave._

 _I just want things to be... different at Blackwell._

* * *

"You're sure you have everything you need, sweetie?" Mom asked for the millionth time that day. She was always so sweet, and it was clearly killing her to say her goodbyes.

"Yes mom, I'm fine," Max answered indignantly. She loved her Mom dearly, and always tried to show it. That said, she was being smothered right now, and a cornered animal's last instinct was to lash out. "Everything's in here, nothing's in the car. If necessary, I have the money on the card you gave me. I'm fine, really."

Her Mom's nod was heartbreaking, and Max immediately felt awful for snapping at all. _Dammit, Mom. Stop that!_ Not like she wasn't feeling scared-excited-AAHHHHHH enough as it was, being in her own dorm room at Blackwell Academy at last. Now she had guilty to add to it.

"Come on, Vanessa. Max is a big girl, she can handle herself," Dad reassured. This seemed to calm Mom down enough to get her to stop nagging. _Thank God._ "That said, if you do need something..."

"Of course, I'll call right away," Max said cutting off her father. She didn't want to watch her parents leave, or to see the tears on her mom's face. Then she might start crying, and nothing would get done.

"Exactly. Let's go, dear. Let Max get settled in. It's a long drive home," Dad said, beckoning Mom out the door. He turned to leave, but stopped just short of closing the door. "Oh, and Max?"

With a sigh as the fates forced her to return her attention to her parents leaving, Max turned back to the door. Her dad was giving her the Vulcan salute and a cheeky smile.

"May the force be with you."

With a laugh, Max shooed him out the door. His boots echoed down the hall as he caught up to mom. And then, Max was alone. In her room. Surrounded by boxes upon boxes of her things, piled in every corner and against every wall she and her parents could find the space to shove boxes. A plant sat by the window with instructions of how to care for it sticky-noted on the rim.

Dad was gone. Mom was gone. She was really free. Free, and at Blackwell Academy. For all that she was excited, she felt entirely overwhelmed all over again. She kinda collapsed onto her bed, and just looked around the room. The school had provided her with a bed, a desk, and a couch with a little table. A closet was built out of the wall in the corner with a drawer in the bottom. Everything in here was entirely hers to play with.

Right now, decorating seemed like a tall order. She was absolutely exhausted from moving boxes into the room already. To move things out of those boxes? No way. Not tonight. She figured they wouldn't give her too much homework on day one.

She stood up, and crossed the room towards her window. Leaning over her plant, Max could see Mom and Dad just as they turned the corner away from the dormitory building. It was already starting to get dark out, Max really hoped they got home okay. Dad would be driving back too, so he was going to sleep like a log after making the few hour trip from Seattle to Arcadia Bay and back, while also spending an extra hour helping to move her stuff into her room. He was the real victim here, it seemed.

Just more proof that she truly was on her own now. And she truly didn't know what to do with it.

Her stomach rumbled, bringing her both a simple problem to solve and a distraction. It seemed some kind of dinner was in order, then. Throwing her hoodie on, Max stepped towards her door and took in a deep breath. The kitchen was just downstairs, below her dorm's hall. It would be easy, wouldn't it? Get in, get food, and get out. Like a ninja. A really hungry ninja who hadn't eaten since her parents stopped them for breakfast on the way down.

It took all of her willpower to step out the door. She locked it behind her, more just to delay leaving the room all that she could than for her security. Not like she had much of value besides her camera in there.

 _Wait, my camera's still in there._ She'd realized not three steps from her door. By then it might've been too late. Another girl down the hall had noticed her, and was already making her approach. She had pretty auburn hair that was contained in a thin ponytail behind her head. Her bra straps was hanging out of her black shirt, which pretty much hovered around her shoulders as much as it was being held up by them.

"Hi there, you must be one of the new girls!" She greeted amicably. She reached out with a hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Dana."

"Uh... Max. Hi." Max carefully took Dana's hand and shook it. _Good start, Girl Blunder. Now the first person you've met knows you're an awkward mess, and you said almost nothing._

If Dana did notice, she didn't seem to mind, for which Max was grateful. "Are you heading down for dinner too?"

"Yeah, something like that. It's... been a long day," Max answered. "Haven't eaten anything since breakfast."

"Well, what are we doing here? Let's go!" Dana practically pulled her down through the dorm building, shooting off questions rapid fire. _I can't answer all of these so fast, is she insane?_

"Is this your first time in Arcadia Bay?" Was one of the ones Max had been able to catch.

"No, actually," Max said. "I grew up here. My parents moved us all to Seattle five years ago."

That gave Dana pause. "It has to be weird for you, then. To be back here again, I mean."

Max nodded. It absolutely was.

"Anyone still in town you need to see?" Dana asked.

Max bit down on her lip. She didn't really know how to answer that one. It was kind of a scary question to consider.

"Gotcha. Say no more."

Max was quickly coming to the conclusion that Dana was pretty okay. A bit overwhelming, and about fifteen notches more extroverted than she was, but definitely on the upper end of outgoing. Max couldn't help but notice her companion - _or captor, looking at how this is going_ \- seemed to be running out of things to ask. Actually, this would be a clever negotiation tactic. Overwhelm someone so much they can't even think about their answers.

Max couldn't even remember leaving the dorm hallway. She just realized at one point they were at the common room door, which was already open and the lights were on. She barely had time to register this before they were through the door.

"Hey Dana!" One girl greeted from across the room, waving at them happily from her place on the couch. She had light brown hair, beautifully done in a bun that was off the the side of her head. _I wish I could pull that off, that looks so good._

"Hey Juliet" Dana greeted back. Of course Max was carted along, pulled into the dreaded inevitability of meeting new people. She wished she had been better dressed for the occasion, as all she had on right now was her hoodie and a plain, uninspired t-shirt. And being less tired would've been wonderful. And less hungry. _I just wanted a salad, why are you doing this to me Dana._

"Who's the new girl?" The alleged Juliet asked curiously.

"Right, Juliet, this is Max. She's down the hall from us now, where... Tara, I think it was? Where she had been in the spring," Dana told her friend. Then she turned to Max. "Max, this is Juliet. She's almost as new as you. She had been living off campus until this year."

"That's how you're going to introduce me?" Juliet asked in a way that was unclear in its meaning. Was she serious? "Not, 'here's Juliet, my best friend?' or 'here's Juliet, budding journalist?'"

"I could have gone with 'here's Juliet, drama queen,' but that didn't seem very nice." Dana shot back. Okay, this was definitely banter. _An astute deduction, Detective Caulfield._

"Right, of course Dana," Juliet teased. She turned to Max. "You should try the donuts, Max. They only look and sound gross, I promise."

She pointed somewhere vaguely behind her, and Max thought that sounded like an okay idea. She thanked Juliet for the suggestion, and stepped away to head in that direction. She could hear Dana behind her, saying "Donuts, Juliet? Seriously? I can't eat those if I'm going to cheer."

"They're worth the risk, Dana. It doesn't even feel like I gained, like, a fraction of a pound!"

The common room was relatively empty at the moment, except for the Dana, Juliet and Max herself. _Probably putting their rooms together, or catching up with their friends elsewhere._ The only other girl was sitting by herself, reading from some really large book in her lap. Max figured she could introduce herself after she got one of these fabled donuts.

She found the donuts on the table. They were... purple. With pink frosting. A note sat beside them, written on stationary with a purple border in incredibly neat handwriting.

 _'Please, enjoy this generous donation of Donuts to your school as a welcome back to Arcadia Bay. Made by spiders," there was a couple of words crossed out after the first comma, so much so that Max couldn't make out the words, "for everyone! Come down to...'_

"Oh," Max said out loud. "'Come down to Muffet's Bakery, on..." She knew that name. That was the spider lady, wasn't it? And that address... That would put it near the shore.

That'd put it close to the Two Whale's, wouldn't it? Yeah, these donuts would have to do for the time being, then. Max wasn't sure she was feeling up to seeing any of the Price family right now. She'd have to do it soon, but... was it so wrong to want to establish herself first amongst her classmates? How sad would it be to run off to the safety of someone she knew immediately?

Besides, Dana and Juliet seemed... Well, not really her crowd, but nice enough. And if everyone was like that here, she could find her 'clique' and settle in fine. And then she could search out Chloe again, and not feel like a total loser.

Was this just her rationalizing putting off facing the music for being a terrible friend? It certainly felt like it, but it was working.

The donuts could wait though. There was a bowl of salad next to it and a stack of smaller bowls for her to use, and that was so much more like her. She took as much as she could reasonably fit, and stepped away contented with her hull. She'd be back for you, donuts.

She figured it was as good a time as any to introduce herself to the other girl. Salad bowl in hand, and not a bite taken of it, she took a breath and walked up to the girl.

"Uh... Hi?" She hazarded awkwardly. The girl looked up, surprise in her hazel eyes. "My name is Max. I'm, uh... new here. At this school."

Realizing what was happening, the girl didn't quite smile back. The thin line her mouth formed was still welcoming. "Kate. Kate Marsh," she answered sweetly. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Likewise," Max said. "Might I ask what you're reading?"

"The book of Matthew," Kate answered. "It's... my favorite."

Max stared at her blankly for a second. Comprehension hit her first, then embarrassment. "Right. The Bible. Sorry, I'm... A little out it right now."

Kate shrugged her shoulders. "Nothing to forgive. If anyone should apologize, it's me. I've been spacey myself today. It's my first day here as well. Father dropped me off with my things early this morning, and unpacking has been a slow process."

"I just got here an hour or two ago, and I haven't even started," Max said. "So, I guess you've got me beat."

That got a giggle. _Score one, Max Caulfield._ Kate seemed to be sweet, and a bit more like Max than Dana or Juliet. They talked for a bit longer about what they expected from classes, Max nibbling away at her salad as they talked. Kate had already eaten, and just wanted the distant company of everyone else in the room. She hadn't actually expected someone to come up to her, Max figured. Somewhere along the line, Max learned they shared Mr. Jefferson's Photography class.

"This is great," Max said. "I know someone I can compare shots with."

"Not notes?" Kate asked curiously.

"Course not. I'm not going to miss a word of his lectures." He was why she'd chosen Blackwell over any other program. That, and the small town vibe that she felt like she missed. And, well, Chloe.

Maybe she _should_ call sooner rather than later.

Something about her comment amused Kate. "Of course. Not what I'm used to, but I might take you up on that. If I may be honest though, I prefer drawing."

"Oh? What kind of drawings?" Max asked. Kate fidgeted a bit.

"Well, it'd be better if you came and saw. Perhaps we could meet for tea some time?" Kate offered. "My treat?"

Max nodded. She looked down at her bowl. She still felt hungry. And the donuts were still there, awaiting the destroyer of prophecy to return. "That sounds great. For now, those donuts are calling me. And I really should get started on putting my room together."

With a wave, Max left Kate to her Bible studying. A donut in hand, she stopped by to say her good nights and cya arounds to Dana and Juliet as well, which only seemed polite. Dana had been the first person she talked to, after all. They had been talking with another girl, but Max didn't stay long enough to introduce herself. She had black hair, with pretty neat red and blue highlights. Max figured she'd feel bad for being so antisocial later, but right now, curling up with her donut like a crazed, starving Hobbitses seemed the perfect alibi to avoid any more social situations until she started school properly the next day.

She was pleased to not run into anyone else on her way back to her room. It was a bit creepy, though. She could hear a tv playing near the top of the steps, probably from the TV Lounge beside the stairs. Opposite of the Lounge room was a room filled with vending machines, the bread and butter of dorm life. She hadn't really registered anything when she was moving her stuff up, and Dana had demanded her full attention on the way out, so this was her first chance to really take in the dormitory hallway.

There were mostly empty billboards along the length of the hall, likely to be filled in a weeks time with student events and club ads alike. Every dorm room along the way to her own had a white board in front of it, most of which were currently untouched. She reached her own room near the end of the hall, and unlocked it posthaste.

The donut was so worth putting off, though. It tasted sweet, just as she expected any donut to taste. Which wasn't normally her thing. However, it also had an odd texture for a donut that just somehow worked.

And wowser, Juliet had not been kidding. Max could normally feel the carbs whenever she ate something that... Well, gluttonous. This donut felt in tune with her. And that was a hell of a lot to think about a donut. That was the last proof she need that it was late, and she was tired.

But... The clock said 7:30. That's wasn't actually late, why did it feel late? _Why, universe?_ She really should start off the first day right, but this wasn't how she wanted her year to start. Not with an early night.

Well, there was one obvious solution: write about her day. She had gotten fairly lackadaisical with keeping up with her diary, and her thoughts were clearly scattering. Guess that was what happened when she only recorded every time she was freaking out. Maybe that could be a personal goal, to write everyday at Blackwell.

It took a few minutes to pull out the journal. She hadn't remembered which box she had stuffed it into. And she didn't keep a pen with it, so she had to scavenge for something to write with. Ink and a feather would've worked for her even.

She found her pen, and she set up shop at the desk. How to start it? _Well, the date probably._

 **September 2, 2013**

 _My first entry from my dorm room at Blackwell. Whew! I haven't had any time to write or even take pictures since I got here. My shit is in boxes all over the room, which is small, but mine, and I never want to leave. I can't wait to decorate! I plan a whole wall o' photos._

 _I did meet a few of my dorm mates. Let's see... Dana was the first one to talk to me. She seems like a total cheerleader, but she was also really nice. She had a friend, Juliet, who also just moved into the dorm. I also met this other girl, Kate something. She seemed like she was deeply religious. I managed to dig out of her that she is going to be in my photography class! Apparently, she also draws, and she invited me to tea some time so I could see them, and so we could compare shots._

 _That's... All of three people. Better than I normally do. I saw a few other people in the halls and such when Dad, Mom and I were bringing in boxes, but didn't get the chance to talk to any of them. Probably for the better. Then again, if everyone's as welcoming as Dana, Juliet, and Kate were, Blackwell is going to be just as great as I imagined._

 _Okay, that's way more than I wanted to write. I was exhausted not even ten minutes ago, now I've got a burst of energy. What the hell was in those spider donuts?_

 _Oh yeah, I had spider donuts, diary. Since sleep now looks impossible, that seems important. It was a gift to the school from that spider monster I met in Seattle. It tasted so good, and I don't feel guilty about it. I did have a salad tho, don't judge me!_

 _Well I have to figure out what I'm going to do with myself now. I'd thought sleep. Guess I could start to put my room together._

* * *

Bzzt.

Bzzt.

Bzzt.

Click!

"not there? that's fine. it is kind of late, and i'd rather be sleeping, too. but, well, when the end of times the stakes i kind of have to be diligent, don't i? you've told me as much yourself, haven't you? uh, no offense."

There was a sigh.

"it's taken a while, but alphys is pretty sure she found them. our elusive time traveler. at least, where he/she is right now. gotta say, you humans all have determination in abundance, but the other virtues are harder to find. didn't have much of a baseline. i'm kind of surprised we found it so quickly. then again, we only had six more to work with."

"whoever he or she is definitely has the determination, but that virtue of hers shined like the sun. i'd know, i met the guy. really lights up the atmosphere. and our time traveler has definitely got enough of something to melt your peepers if you stare too long. alphys says she traced the purple lines source, and found it aligns with the signals of the purple soul asgore had let her study."

"i think she said it was perseverance? not my field of study, not nearly enough theoretical nonsense to prank people with. anyway, she tracked it out west to a small town by the pacific coast. same place muffet went, actually. arcadia bay, oregon. or organ, as papyrus would say. wouldn't really feel welcome myself if that had been the case."

"i'm going to be heading out there as soon as i can, and i want you and asriel with me. looked into the town a bit. figured that you like to draw, and asriel likes his pictures. we have a story to tell toriel and asgore."

"there's a school there, blackwell. it's famous for its artsy stuff. photography teacher is apparently famous."

"that's what you'll be telling your mom and the king when I ask them if i can bring you guys along. you're just visiting, hoping the visit to a famed school will inspire you through middle school and such. i hate to go behind tori's back like this, or papyrus's, or anyone's. unfortunately, them's the breaks."

"call me back, the sooner the better. we want to get there as soon as we're able, and not a day later. if i have to drive you there myself, i will. actually, a road trip sounds great. it would let us come up with a game plan, relax before everything inevitably goes bad."

"i'm eating away at your time now, so i'm going to go now and eat away at grillby's menu instead. call back."

Click.

* * *

 **Mostly setup here. This chapter is the first time using Frisk's perspective, and Max's as well. Next chapter will be the same, likely being balanced more towards Max whilst the Undertale characters make their way towards Arcadia Bay. Even before they get there, Max's first hours in Blackwell have changed because of the monsters. Literally, just donuts changed her first perception of the other people in her dorm, and her first journal entry in the dorm.**

 **As the title suggests, I wanted to lay out the differences between these two immediately. The awkward normality of Max's situation, even if her school is new to her, next to Frisk's... everything. He has another person living in his thoughts, he has a boss monster as an adoptive mom, he has powers over the flow of time, his adoptive 'brother' is also a monster, and was also dead/soulless not that long ago.**


	3. Looking for Group

**september 3, 2013**

 _here for the daily update on my life. not that it'll matter if this next month or so goes down its worst route._

 _kids finally talked to tori about leaving. can't believe she agreed to allow us the 'road trip' bit, given how suddenly this came up for her. guess that's just like us monsters, to take these things in stride. she did insist on putting together their school work for the next month. dunno if the kids'll begrudge the work, or be happy for the distraction. it'll be a lot of driving, and i'm not looking forward to that either._

 _we all went to talk to asgore together. as for how that went? pretty sure he's already called up blackwell, and made whatever promises he needs to just so that his son can walk in the door. it probably won't be cheap for him, but the king looked so excited to help. to do something for his son. meaning meeting him went as well as it could. asriel barely said a word the whole time._

 _their relationship, that being the king and his son... too complicated for me. lots of emotions there. asriel knows what his dad did while the kid was dust, and he's probably hard pressed to forgive him for it. prince loves humans, and probably always has since that first one fell. it was before my time, though._

 _all just speculation on my part. i hope i'll forgive me for that, if i ever read this with fresh eyes. it's pen, so i'm not erasing it. got an inkling you'll deal with it,_ quill _you not?_

 _papyrus was excited for me when i told him what we were doin'. y'know, with me taking an active role, trying to do something actively for someone else. doing an activity. lots of emphasis on that active word. he thinks i'm learning to not be lazy. sorry paps, just saving the world. lots of procrastinating i haven't done yet._

 _papyrus wanted to come along too, but this next month's going to be busy for him. he's going to be arguing for monster citizenship in america, on the grounds that even though we weren't born on american soil, we were born under it. good luck with that bro. we've agreed to call every day, if we're able, so i'll still be able to keep track of everything going on with him._

 _he won't be hearing about everything we're doing. just stuff about the school, how the kids like it, probably a few of my best bad jokes when i can snake them in. i'm counting on you to deliver if the kid turn back the clock. it's for the best he doesn't get more than that. not that i have ever thought he couldn't take this time stuff, he'd probably take it better than me. i just don't think i want him to._

 _don't alway feel sure why i'm telling me this, i know it already. unless whoever is reading this isn't me. in that case, yes frisk. i keep a journal, just for you to read._

 _since you're reading anyway, just a few weeks until we leave, kid. september 21, we take off. we'll be at arcadia bay between october the third and fifth, depending on how much we slack off. i hope you're ready for whatever we find when we get there, kid._

* * *

English was going to be awesome, Max thought as she walked out of the room. She wasn't sure what had possessed her to request to be moved into the AP course, but she was going to have to thank that spirit if she ever met it. Mrs Hoida seemed awesome so far, and really passionate about her subject. Of course Blackwell would have only the best teachers.

Max was admittedly a bit apprehensive about that first assignment. Seriously, a three paragraph introductory letter to the teacher? That was going to suck. _Why can't I write about anything but me? Like, photos! Photographers! Movies? Books? The weather?_ At least she had a couple of days to do that, and it didn't seem likely that the rest of her teachers would bury her in homework on day one. It was a college level course, she could forgive that.

Max had more important things to think on now. She had her schedule in her hand as she stepped to the side of the hall. The sounds of the hallway were drowned out by her heart pounding as she reread what her next class was. 'The Language of Photography.'

Mark Jefferson's class. The class that could make or break her future.

 _Don't freak out, Max. You've got to get into the room, into your seat. Then you can freak out and be on time, and it will be a very punctual freak out._

She didn't need to go to her locker for anything, she was carrying all of her materials for her morning classes in her bag. Thus , all that she had to was move herself down the stairs onto the first floor, and down the hall. The whole school was two floors, and fairly compact. Given that the student base was fairly selective, they probably didn't need a whole lot of different rooms.

She had woodenly avoided her classmates in the halls, hovering closer to the lockers and walls than most would probably feel comfortable with. Finally, she could see the door, hanging open. There he was, holding the door open, and she could have screamed.

Between the glasses and the hair, Mark Jefferson already looked the part of a hipster. The suit he was wearing today, classy as all hell and even looking ironed on top of it complimented the image. _He looks every part a stereotypical artist._

 _Don't freak out don't freak out dontfreakoutmax._

"Hello," Mr. Jefferson greeted as she stepped into the door. "You are supposed to be in the Language of Photography, right?"

 _AAAAAAAH_

"Um, yes?" Max questioned. She shook her head and tried to reaffirm her certainty. It instead came out as, "I mean, uh, yes. I am."

Mr. Jefferson chuckled at her answer. Her declaration didn't seem to be having the desired effect. _And now he knows I'm a loser._

"Well, at least someone's early. Brought your camera, or maybe a phone?" He asked next.

"Of course," Max answered, patting the bag hanging from her side. "I always have my camera on me."

Except that time last night where she did not have her camera. How unarmed it had made her feel, like she was missing a part of her being. She had double checked, then triple checked to make sure she had it in her bag this morning when she got up. And what a rough awakening it had been, giving how late she'd been up. At least most of her things were out of their boxes, though she doubted her dorm mates felt so happy about the noise.

Her answer seemed to satisfy Mr. Jefferson, who smiled at her answer this time.

"That's a good habit to have for a photographer. The world doesn't wait for you to run home to grab it." He quirked his brow curiously. "I assume that's why you're here, isn't it? Miss...?"

"Max. Caulfield," she answered. "And yes. I've loved taking pictures since forever. I can't see myself doing anything else."

His lips twitched upwards once again, and Max could have died. _How is he so perfect?_

"Well, now you've got me excited, Max. I'll see you inside. Sit wherever you want, there's no assigned seating," he said, ushering her at last into his classroom.

 _Okay Max, somehow you didn't explode._ Her pulse was elevated to the point of reverberating in her skull, and breathing was predictably a manually controlled mess right now. At least she could let herself breath now that the most immediately scary part of her day was past.

Jefferson's classroom wasn't quite what she was used to. In the place of desks were tables, arranged in a circle around an open center. _Perfect place for a campfire, if someone wanted to go crazy._ The blackboard was largely blank right now, except for a brief 'Welcome to Language of Photography!' greeting, followed by Mark Jefferson's signature.

She walked to the back of the room and looked upon the billboards. _Jefferson's legacy._ Magazine covers, commissions, and shots that he just liked. That one there was the cover of Pop Vine, asking in large text "IS GRUNGE DEAD?" and boasting of holding shots from Jefferson himself. It was only the cover, so it was with a heavy heart Max had to acknowledge she wouldn't find the contents without the magazine itself. _Maybe he has an extra copy lying around, and would let me borrow it if I asked._ Or she could just look them up on the Internet, like anyone else would do. That seemed like a safe option.

Max took a seat next to the boards, placing her bag on the floor next to her. Sitting there meant that she could look at them anytime. It also gave her an overview of the entire classroom, which was going to be very helpful. Somehow, the position also made her feel powerful. _Bow before your Queen, plebeians._

The others started to filter into the room after her, a solid half-minute later. _Was I really that early, or did everyone else get lost?_ A Hispanic-looking boy was the first one in, followed by a couple of girls. One had black hair with awesome looking purple highlights. In general, she had a sort of gothic look about her, finished by the cross around her neck. The other girl wore a green hoodie and glasses, and had her hair tied up in a ponytail.

The next girl to enter was a familiar face. She stepped into the room a bit cautiously, her blouse looking a bit too warm for the weather. She seemed just as overwhelmed by the room she found herself in as Max did.

"Hey Kate," Max said as she recognized the girl. This got her attention, and Kate's lips tugged the slightest bit upwards. She moved towards Max's seat with a bit more certainty than she'd entered the room with.

"Hey... Max, right?" She asked.

"Yeah. You want to...?" Max left her question unfinished, letting her vague gesture beside her fill in the blank. This revealed a problem. There wasn't actually another chair at the table. "Uh... Slide a chair over?"

The distinct lack of chair seemed to disappoint Kate, who shook her head. "I'll be fine, Max. I mean, more room to work with if there's only one of at a table, right?" Kate offered a smile before taking a seat at the next table over to the right of her, sitting on the opposite side of the computer that share the table.

Barring Jefferson himself, only three more people filtered into the room. The guy has darker skin, and looked incredibly relaxed as he stepped into the room. _Or incredibly stoned... Yep. I saw enough of that in Seattle to recognize someone who's blazed when I see them._

The last two stood out the most. Actually the reason was pretty clear. The one girl, her hair a blonde mass that stretched down her back, didn't really leave much of an impression. The other girl however...

 _That cashmere is probably more expensive than everything in my entire closet. Including the closet._

Short blonde hair, brushed to precision, the perfect shade of eyeliner, the remarked upon purple and impressive cashmere, the not entirely modest skirt... This girl looked loaded. Evidentially, Max must have been staring. As soon as this girl noticed her, she looked her up and down and scoffed.

 _Okay, what I was doing wasn't especially cool either, but really?_ Max turned to admire the window intently for the briefest of moments. The rich girl and her accomplice sat at the same table, just to Max's left.

And then Mark Jefferson walked in.

"Okay class, put away your phones, shut down your conversations and take your seats."

There was a shuffle of activity as Max moved to follow the teacher's command. Out of her bag came the essentials. Her camera, of course, her notebook, a pencil bag. After a brief moment's consideration, her journal came out too. It seemed right having it out. Worst came to worst, she could doodle in the empty margins.

"Now, before we begin properly, I'm supposed to try and learn your names. And take attendance, to make sure you've actually shown up," Mr. Jefferson continued, heading to his own desk in the front corner of the room. He picked up a clipboard and then stepped up to the center of the room.

"Alyssa?" He started.

"Here," the gothic looking girl answered. Jefferson marked something down on the sheet.

"Daniel?"

"Here," the Hispanic boy said. That was when the jitters hit Max, like suddenly this was the most important thing in her life.

 _Oh good. The anxiety of taking attendance._

"Hayden?"

"Hey," The stoned dude by the door answered. Another check on the attendance sheet.

"Kate?"

"Present," Kate said. She was marked down.

 _Heh_. Mark _ed down._ Max _imal Punnage._ It didn't calm her nerves.

"Maxine?" He had already been looking at her when her name came up.

"Here," she answered quickly. Maybe a bit oddly too. "I... Uh, prefer Max." Still, she felt the entire planet roll off her shoulder onto the floor and once more her respiratory system returned to functionality. Jefferson nodded, and continued down the list.

"Stella?"

"Here." Girl with the hoody and ponytail.

"Taylor?"

"Here," the girl with the longer blonde hair answered.

"And, last but not least, Victoria?" He looked at the last girl inquisitively.

"Right here, Jefferson," she answered with a raise of her hand and a sickly-sweet lilt in her voice. _Oh god, what even is she doing?_

Jefferson took the introduction in stride, and marked her as present. He placed the clipboard back on his desk and took his place in the middle of the gathering of tables. He sat on the corner of Daniel's table, and clapped his hands together.

"That's everyone then," he was saying all the while. "Good start, no one's playing hooky on day one. Yes, I know, who would do such a thing? The answer to that question is 'enough that I need to take attendance every day.' So get here on time every day."

Max chuckled uncomfortably, though a few other people seemed amused by it too. That Victoria girl, for one.

"Anyway, welcome to the Language of Photography," The teacher continued. "If you don't know me, my name is Mark Jefferson. Mr. Jefferson will do for you." He leaned forward a bit. "I was raised here in Arcadia Bay, and moved away after high school to the East Coast. I attended the American Academy of Art in Chicago in the nineties as a photography major, and managed to take a few shots that apparently, people liked. I worked for years as a professional for several publications, and went on to publish my own books a few years back. I've been back here in Arcadia Bay for three years now as a teacher, and thus... Here I am."

Max knew all of this. She had read up on him a few years ago, after reading his name in a book of famous photographers. Imagine her shock, seeing her hometown in a book about famous people? She hadn't heard of him before. Even in Seattle, she'd still held an attachment to this little town, and so her natural inclination had been to learn everything she could. She hadn't stopped following news on him since.

That was why, when she read that Jefferson had started teaching, Blackwell had become her number one priority. A dream, just like Seattle had been as a child. And now she was living her dream all over again. _Hopefully, this one lives up to my expectations._

It was a solid start so far.

"Don't worry, none of you need to get up here and introduce yourselves the same way. I hated that in school too. We've got all year to get to know each other." Jefferson pushed himself off the table and stood over them all, a god among men. _What's a Queen to a God?_ "So, let's begin. Who here can explain what an image is?"

There was a silence as Jefferson stepped in a circle looking for anyone to answer.

Then Victoria's hand shot up.

"Yes, Victoria?" Jefferson asked.

"An image is a single frame that is captured in some way, by our eyes, our memory, or a painting, among other things," she answered. It sounded rehearsed, and like utter bull.

It seemed to impress Jefferson though, who smiled at the answer. "Very good answer. Almost like I've read it before. It looks like someone has already started their reading, which is impressive since I haven't handed out the book yet." He laid his hand into the table. "Follow-up question: what is a photograph?"

"An image specifically captured using, say, a camera, or a phone and printed out," Victoria answered again, much quicker this time. _Kiss ass._ Jefferson shook his head in amusement.

"Alright, Victoria. You've proven you can read. I want to see if anyone here can think," Jefferson said. Victoria leaned back in her chair, seemingly torn between being smug at being right and being pretty much banned from answering the next question. "Who here can tell me what it takes to make a good photograph?"

Not wanting to shown up Max actually did have an answer for that, and her hand went up. She wracked her mind for the right idea, and latched onto it as soon as she was called. "The emotional contents of the image. Maybe helped by a few lighting tricks."

Jefferson raised a brow, crossed his arms and leaned back a bit curiously. _Did I say something wrong?_

"That sounds like only part of a definition, Max. Don't keep me in suspense, what's the rest?" His prompting seemed to have the whole room staring at her. _I'd have rather been absolutely wrong._

"It, uh... Depends on what you want to capture? Like, um, beauty? City life? A crisis? A day in someone's life? If you don't accomplish that, then all the lighting and technique in the world won't make your image stand out. In the words of Andreas Feineger, 'A technically perfect photograph can be the world's most boring picture'," Max answered, citing one of her secret favorites. Lots of bullshit, all spewing out of her mouth at a whim. She suddenly didn't feel too great, as the silence stretched out longer and longer as Jefferson and her classmates considered her answer.

One eternity later, Jefferson smiled.

"An interesting take on it. I suppose I could agree, to an extent," he said. Max blinked twice. _Wait really?_ "That still doesn't feel like a full answer, so perhaps we could get some help filling in the blanks. Alyssa, if you could capture any concept in a photo, what would your first choice be?"

"Um... growing up?" The girl hazarded.

"And, saying we were to capture it in a single picture, what would you want the picture to be of?"

Alyssa leaned back in her seat and thought about it. "A teenager's room."

Jefferson nodded at this answer.

"How about you, Hayden? How would you depict the idea of growing up?"

"Uh, well... How about a younger man's diploma?"

"A more literal sign of progress. And you, Kate? How would you do it?"

"A child just after their baptism," she said without hesitation. Though after a hesitant pause, she added, "Or an older person, alongside an old toy they used to love."

"A rise of passage, or a show of how little we truly grow up. I like it. Daniel?"

Jefferson went around to each and every person in the room, asking each person what they would take a picture of. Daniel would take a picture of two sketches, drawn years apart with years of practice between them. Taylor, the top of her dresser. Stella thought up a photo of her folder at home, filled with every report card she'd received since she was in elementary school.

"Victoria?"

"Well, a girl's first car, or her first date."

Jefferson nodded. "And now back to you Max. By your own definition, how would you define growing up in a picture?"

Max leaned back in her chair and thought about it. The answer seemed obvious. But, was it really right to give that answer without Chloe's permission? It was kind of personal. Her dilemma must have seeped into her face, since concern slipped onto Jefferson's face. _Fuck it._

"A friend of mine and I kept track of our heights, who was growing taller and when. Her dad used to scratch it into the wall in her room. So, I'd take a picture of that," she answered. Jefferson nodded again. In a weird way, she still felt like she'd just told everyone too much about herself.

"That's everybody right? Well, I can't pick a favorite answer. You're all right," Jefferson announced. "Objectively there is no true right answer. And there lies what I'm trying to get through, and likely what Max had meant. When someone looks at a photo, they need to be able to invest in it somehow. Whether it's just family looking back on a memory, or an idea being pushed, if your photo, your image conveys something it's a success. The better it does so, whether it's a strong reaction in a few or a lesser reaction in the many depends on why the picture was being taken in the first place."

"To be able to do that, you need all the tools possible, whether literal or technical. In spite of Feineger's insight brought to us by Max, technique does help. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why you will be sitting in here listening to this old hipster ramble for the next nine months."

From there, Jefferson gave them a run down of how the course was going to go for at least that semester. He'd passed out a syllabus, which included his grading style and a schedule for how the winter semester was going to go. The bell rang too soon, and it was hesitantly that they all filed out of the room for lunch. Not without him assigning reading and passing out the book itself, first. _Sigh._

She was curious how Victoria already had the book, though. She had refused one at the end of class, waving around a tablet of sorts. _Did she buy it ahead of time?_

"See you tomorrow, Max. Good answers in class today," he'd told her as she walked of the room. Her heart was a flutter, and she forgot for a moment her distaste in sharing something so personal with strangers. But only a moment.

"'Good answer, Max,'" Victoria mocked from behind her in the hall. She left no hint of the sweetness she had in her voice for Mr. Jefferson. Max frowned, as she could feel just how fruitful this next conversation was going to be. _Oh good. Guess even here there's going to be drama and bullshit._ "Honestly, though. He wasn't impressed in the slightest. He just felt bad."

"Do we have a problem?" Max asked, trying to keep her voice neutral. It didn't work, but by damn did she try.

"Um, yeah. I do actually," Victoria said acidly. She didn't say anything immediately after that, feeling content to speed up to cut off Max. She tried to step around to find the other blonde girl from class, Taylor, was blocking her there too. Together the two girls backed her up against a locker. Victoria adopted a proud, smile then, standing tall over Max.

"Let me lay down a bit of reality for you, 'Max.' First off, that look is awful in every sad hipster way. You stand out in the worst way. Second-" Victoria's stance changed, as she leaned in closer and got inches away from Max's face. _Here comes the actual 'problem'_ "you're not going to keep Jefferson's attention forever. He's going to realize you're just another cliche as soon as he sees our first photos. He's going to see that I'm not. So you can crawl back to your dorm now, and pack. Save yourself the time and heartbreak."

And with that, Victoria smiled, and waved for her crony to follow her down the hall.

 _What the fuck was that for?_

"Max, are you okay?" An approaching voice asked, accompanied by footsteps. Max turned towards the voice, and saw Kate approaching her.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Max answered. "I think I just got attacked, but I have no idea."

"How awful," Kate said in earnest. "She sounded angry, from what little I caught."

Max shook her head. "I don't know. I appreciate the concern though. Are you heading to lunch now?"

With something almost approaching a smile, Kate nodded. _Good, backup. In case drama decides to corner me again._

"I left my lunch in my locker, so I'll need to stop there first," Kate said. Max nodded.

"Same. I'll find you in the Cafeteria," Max told the girl. Right now, having a bit of time to stew sounded like what she needed. And the day had been going so well, too.

* * *

 **September 3rd, 2013**

 _Blackwell sucks ass! I told myself not to whine so soon, but damn... The day started like Christmas morning. I barely had any dreams, partly because of sugar induced insomnia and partly because I was so pumped to start my first official day of my new life. Like a dork I couldn't figure out what to wear, so I chose what was on the floor. I'm normally awful with names, but I did manage to retain a few new ones over the day. Brooke, Alyssa... Taylor..._

 _And here's where I write in the sigh. How could I forget about Victoria Chase? Rich, stylish, entitled. I could feel INSTANT JUDGEMENT when she looked at my raggedy ass clothes. As if I'm at Blackwell to strike fashion poses... Maybe I'm being extra crispy sensitive, but I think Victoria wants life here to be like her own reality show. She already fabricated drama with me, and I don't foresee her getting any easier to deal with._

 _So that wasn't fun along with my general social unease... I thought it would be easier being back. Call the waaahmbulance! I don't want this day to end all "Woe is Max". It was incredible to walk across the green campus in the morning mist. I love the stony steps and brick walls of Blackwell. It's so atmospheric in isolation. Everything is a picture waiting to be taken... Speaking of, at least on great thing did happen today: Mr. Jefferson's photography class. Sigh..._

 _There's more to tell but journal, forgive me, I'm truly wiped out._

 **September 4th, 2013**

 _I have an assload of homework already. So much bullshit. At least give us noobs a day to acclimate. But, to prove I'm not a total loser, I made a new friend in my science class. His name is Warren Graham and he's a serious geek, plus he's dark and witty._

 _He comes across as kind of a know-it-all, but it turns out he does kind of know a lot. We talked about photographers, and he actually named a few I'd never heard of. We traded numbers and he'll be a good study partner (or a good friend). I'll need at least one based on the clique action here. I thought being 18 meant I didn't have to deal with this teenage drama anymore. I THOUGHT._

 _At least I get to research famous photographers for some of my homework. Mr. Jefferson assigned us a ton of reading, but this is exactly what I want to study. Jefferson is supercool and superchill._

 _He doesn't try to be too hop, just says what he thinks and expects us too as well. I think he's a genius. OMG I WANT TO MARRY HIM. Just joking. This one class is worth all of the social dysfunction._

 **September 15, 2013**

 _Homework is kicking my ass. I bet the teachers grade harder just to stop you from feeling special. But Victoria Chase and her snob minions still front like they're honored guests of Blackell. The bros here aren't any different. Nathan Prescott is Victoria's male clone, with way more money and attitude, if that's possible._

 _His family is the oldest in Arcadia Bay and I heard stories about them when I was a kid. The Prescotts give a shitload of bank to Blackwell, so Nathan acts like he literally owns the school. The other day during class, he put his feet on the desk, started texting and the teacher didn't say jack!_

 _I'd get suspended. But him and Victoria are part of this silly elite "Vortex Club" that puts on popular parties and so they get their way. It's good to be king and queen._

 _I guess I could be called one of the lucky ones. Victoria only notices me because we're both in Mr. Jefferson's class, and we're just across the hall from each other in the dorms. She's just been passive aggression and rude comments. Nathan, on the other hand..._

 _Is it bad to be happy that I'm too 'lowly' for him to deign to notice me? I heard that Hayden and him cornered Daniel because Nathan didn't like how Daniel's sketch of him came out. You knew who you were commissioning to sketch you dude. With how good I know Daniel is, it's safe to say that's just how you look naturally Nathan. No I'm not sorry. Daniel doesn't deserve that, especially not from an ass like Nathan._

 _I swear he has creeped me out since I first saw him, before I even knew his name._

 _I shouldn't act so angry like this. It's like everything I've written since the school year started has been about this sucking or that.. And not everyone here is awful. Kate Marsh, who I met on my first night here, is pretty cool. She's down the hall from me, and in my photography class. She's so pretty and sweet and friendly. It makes her more beautiful than the beeatches here like Victoria who think beauty is just your face and outfit. Those are only multipliers._

 _Okay, enough Max. Don't play their games._

* * *

The bell rang too soon, just as it felt like it always did in Mr. Jefferson's class. With a clap of the hands, Mr. Jefferson started his goodbyes.

"Alright, remember to finish the reading before Friday, because there will be a quiz. And once again, you have two weeks to enter the Everyday Heroes competition. The pictures are due on in two weeks on Wednesday, October 10th. The winner gets to join me in San Francisco where their picture will be on display alongside winners from across the country. So get to work, this could be the start to your careers."

 _Yeah, no pressure._ Max picked up her school possessions and stuffed them into her bag, starting with her notebook and ending with her camera. Everything clear, she lifted the bag over her shoulder and let it rest against her side. The only other student still in the room was, of course, Victoria.

"So, Mr. Jefferson, any suggestions on what to shoot?" She'd asked with a flirtatious lilt. She was leaning against the teacher's desk at the front of the room, her heel kicked off the ground.

"Your very best shot, Victoria, and nothing less," he answered plainly, looking back down at his paperwork. _Go Jefferson!_ With a huff, Victoria left the room. Max made to follow her out the door. "I trust you intend to enter too, Max."

Startled, Max nearly walked right into the T.V. by the door. She spun around to find Jefferson looking up at her inquisitively.

"Uh, yeah. Of course," she muttered in return. She unconsciously grabbed her arm, a nervous tick she barely registered.

"Good. It is why you're here. Having seen a few of your other shots, I know you'll think of something good." With the that, he returned to his work.

After a moment of staring at Jefferson dumbly, Max turned out the door into the bustle of the hallway. _That was nice of him. I probably wouldn't have even considered it._ Not that she shouldn't, but she knew how she got. Nervous and stressed, which would make her procrastinate, which would make her further unnerved and further stressed. It began a viscous cycle that ended with nothing at all getting accomplished.

"Maximus Prime!" A familiar voice called across the hall. She turned to face the speaker, knowing only one person would address her in such a way. Or period, without some backhanded insult. _Thats not fair. There's Kate, and Dana isn't bad either. Juliet, too, depending on the day. The skater guys..._ His unkempt brown hair was the first thing to appear from the crowd of the halls. "What's up?"

"Too much for one Transformer, Warren," she answered glumly. "Homework was one thing, but now Jefferson wants us to enter a competition."

"Oh? That sounds like something you should tell me about," Warren told her. They started down the hallway towards the front door of the building. Max didn't need to go to her locker. She had stopped going there at all after the first week except to hide/retrieve her lunch.

"He's calling it the 'Everyday Heroes' competition," Max began. "Apparently, other schools around the country are all doing it, and all the winners will be flown to San Francisco to have their picture shown off."

Warren whistled. "That sounds awesome. I mean, that's what you'd wanted, right?"

"Well, yeah..." Max sighed.

"I'm smelling a but," Warren said in a joking manner. In spite of his tone, Max knew that she had his full attention.

"But now it's real, and that's terrifying," Max turned her head to Warren. "I haven't even gotten any pictures around the campus yet, and now I have to try and jumpstart my career on a whim."

Warren nodded, and patted her back gently. _Damn if you aren't trying, Warren._ "That sounds stressful. I know you'll think of something though. If there's anything I can do to help..."

"Know any way to stop time for me so I don't have to worry about it for a while?" Max tried. With an overblown frown, Warren shook his head.

"Not really. I could slow down time for just you if we had a rocket ship, but that wouldn't do a thing for extending your grounded deadlines," Warren looked dramatically to the horizon. It was kind of impressive he even managed to get that across, considering they were still in the hallway.

They turned out the main entrance of the main school building. The grounds were littered with students, as per usual just after classes ended for the day. Max saw Brooke, the girl with red and blue highlights in her hair, reading some sort of catalog. The skater guys were by the edge of the lawn, grinding on the edges of a bench and doing some 'rad' tricks. The one guy, Justin, spun his board around after kicking off of the bench and drifted backwards blindly for a moment. _I could never pull that off. I'd fall on my face._

Max and Warren stepped down the small flight of stairs, and around the edge of the fountain.

"I need to drop off my stuff at my room. I think I actually have some time later, if you want to help me with Ms. Grants homework." It was a more desperate plea than Max let on. Warren for his part sighed.

"Alas, fair maiden, I cannot," he had the most apologetic of smiles. "I've got a family call to look forward to, and I'm not about to miss a call from the family. The homework isn't due for a couple more days, so how does tomorrow sound?"

Max sighed. "Fair enough, Warren."

They silently passed into the dormitory grounds. Zachary and Logan were passing their football back and forth in relative silence, a common sight on the grounds. Alyssa set her school things beside her on a bench, and was pulling some book from her bag. Otherwise, the dormitory's yard was quiet. _Oh, sorry. 'Prescott Hall.' Because of course it's not enough that they practically own the damn school, they need their name on the place I sleep._

They stepped inside the front door, where the building was split practically down the center. A divide between the girls' and boys' dorm halls.

"I'll see you around, Max," Warren waved, still visibly sorry. He started heading towards the boys rooms.

"Cya Warren," Max returned, moving towards her own hall.

Truly alone, Max decided to revel in the solitude. She pushed her back against the nearest wall and pulled out her earbuds. With the tap of a button, her music was begun. _Syd Matters, nice pick shuffle._

With the sound of guitar playing in her ear, Max pushed in the door and started up the steps. Her room was on the second floor. Below her room would be the kitchen, which was a mildly inconvenient trek when she got the munchies. She did have a decent view of the yard, though the sight of the rest of Blackwell was blocked by the L shape of the girls rooms. She passed Dana and Juliet on the steps, and acknowledged them with a nod.

No one was in the hallway ahead of her. She made it to her room at the end of the hall, and pushed the door open. No one bothered to lock their doors anymore. It was a bit of a girl code thing that most of their hall had adopted, even when they hated each other. No one was going to say no in case of an emergency, and if shit really hit the fan for someone, everyone's door was open to them. That was the theory, at least. _Thanks for that idea, Dana. I hope it won't become necessary._

Stepping into her room, Max immediately marched to the opposite side of the room and laid her bag on the desk. With nothing but her thoughts left, Max stepped back, and sat down on the edge of her bed.

Her room was no longer a mess of boxes. Truly, it hadn't been since that first sleepless night. Except for her desk, it couldn't even qualify as a mess. She had a few magazines covering her side table, and schoolwork on her desk, but otherwise her room looked tidy. _Even my bed beneath me is made. Or was before I fell onto it._ She had old photos hung up on the wall next to her desk. Pictures of her friends from Seattle, pictures with her parents. Only one picture in the room was framed. One that sat on the dresser at the foot of her bed.

 _When the hell will you get the stomach to just call her, Max._

Her room had become her sanctuary at the end of every day, a place to hide away for a while. Her guitar leaned against the couch invitingly, begging her to play along to the song in her ear. By the window was the plant Mom had left to her care. _Just water it once every couple of days. When was the last time I did that?_

Max turned off her music, and laid back on her bed for a moment. The wall beside her was blank. She _had_ been hoping to cover it in photographs, but she hadn't taken any yet. None with friends, no scenery, not even a good moment that she was only baring witness to.

 _Nothing I could just pawn off as my best and turn in for the contest. I can't even be lazy right._

The light outside her window wasn't going anywhere fast. Birds were still singing out there. Without Warren to save her from her science, she was at a loss for what to do. She could do the reading for Jefferson's class, but he'd just recap most of it in a couple of weeks time. It'd be easier to skim the chapters after that, since he didn't do pop quizzes. The first test was still a couple of weeks away.

 _It is a pretty nice day out. I'm not doing homework. Why am I in bed?_

Hadn't she just been thinking about having not taken any photo-walks around campus? Max pulled herself to a sit, and practically threw herself at her bag. She emptied her actually school supplies onto her desk, leaving only her journal, her camera, and a few essentials in the bag. She nearly took off out the door in that instant, but she caught her own face in the mirror. _As good a start as any._

She pulled her camera from her bag, held in up to her eye. The lighting wasn't perfect, but it was an impromptu shot. Once Max had herself centered in the frame, she took the photo. No flash, not for a mirror shot. The photo slid out, and Max took it. She gave it a quick shake before seeing how it came out.

 _I look just like an awkward teenage girl, taking a selfie with a camera bigger than my face._

 _You really shouldn't hide your face next time... Takes away that emotional investment we talked about on day one. Makes you seem soulless._

It didn't seem worth trying again then and there though, she had an entire Blackwell to take photos of. With a smile on her face, Max left her room with camera in hand.

* * *

"Uh, Enjoy your stay, mister... Um, the Skeleton?"

"thanks, i intend to," Sans answered, much to Frisk's amusement. It was the family name, Frisk knew, but it was still funny. Humans had not been taking to monsters as easily as monsters did humans, but stuff like this was harmless. Funny, even.

It hadn't really escalated into anything especially bad anywhere, as far as Frisk knew. Not that there was a lot of opportunity, given that all the monsters outside of Ebott had too much media attention on them for anyone to get away with a ruckus near them. The ones inside it were all under government protection. That upset a lot of anti-change people, but they'd change their tune when the monster's gold reached them. Money does that to people.

That line of thought led him to glance at Asriel as he reconsidered it. _There are a lot of Floweys out here, isn't that what you'd said?_

A sobering thought. Frisk disliked those. And it was entirely his own, too.

I had thought us past this finger pointing.

With the a sigh, Frisk had to agree. Chara wasn't the cause of his thoughts, or his problems. Chara couldn't even manage to be the cause of most of them.

It has never been my intent to be a burden.

The inn they were staying at was a bit small and pretty run down looking, but Frisk kind of liked it. It had two floors, with the second floor connected by a balcony. There were scratches and cracks in the wood, and even a few glass shards in the parking lot. If they had arrived a few weeks earlier, the pool might have even been open. It probably wouldn't have been especially clean, but it would have been open. But alas, the ides of September were a couple days past, and with it the changing of the season was kicking in. Not by a lot, thanks to this 'Climate Change' thing that Mom had started reading on recently.

She had been astonished by the Summer weather, and demanded to know the cause. The internet was still hard for her, as she never even had the chance to experience the Undernet, but she was certainly up to the learning curve.

Their room was on the bottom floor, near the end. _As far as humanly possible from where we parked, of course._ The room itself was small, only having two beds for the three of them to share. It didn't have a tv, but there was a tiny fridge.

"think i saw an ice machine out there," Sans said as he threw his bag onto the closer bed. "get the bed situation sorted out, i'll be back in a minute or twenty."

Just as quickly, Sans disappeared out the door. Frisk and Asriel watched him go, and then turned to each other. Asriel held an unspoken plea on his face, just like he had had the past two days when they stopped for the night. The last two stops had been a lot nicer, though.

"Where do you want me?" Frisk asked, knowing what was coming, Asriel smiled, and stepped around him to take in the room.

"Hm... The place is a bit dirty. We've done relaxing on the bed before, too," the Prince put his hand to his chin and surveyed the room.

"How about one with both of us this time?" Frisk suggested, hoping onto the side of the far bed. "You set a timer, and hop on the bed next to me."

Asriel took in this idea. He seemed conflicted. Frisk shook his head.

"Just do it, Asriel. You'll be happy to have the picture, someday," Frisk patted the bed beside him. Asriel let out a sigh, and smiled up at him. He started to fiddle with the camera, before setting it down on the opposite bed facing them.

Leave a spot for me. I will make Asriel's favorite face.

 _Chara, I wish we could. There is a problem with that, though._

Not being classified as a physical entity has yet to stop Napstablook's face from appearing in the tabloids.

 _And he's better at answering my calls than you, even though you live in my head. It's different and you know it._

The emotional equivalent of a shrug edged onto Frisk's being as the picture was taken. The prince jumped off the bed as the photo slid out of the front of the camera, where the prince grabbed it. Frisk looked over Asriel's shoulder to see the picture. Look. It seems I have made it into the photo anyway. There is my addition.

Asriel looked as happy as could be, in the forced sort of sense that most people are for a photo. He truly looked like a dork in that sweater, but the trail had gotten surprisingly cold today, and his natural coat wasn't doing enough for him. _Maybe if it gets colder, we can get him back in that scarf!_

An unlikely happenstance.

Memory of the weather reports passes through your mind. All sunny or cloudy until the Rockies. Likely warm again once you descend. The memory is just as dull as the first time you went through the reports.

Frisk, on the other hand, showed a hint of his exchange with Chara on his face. His smile looked forced, even for a photo. His eyes were averted to the empty space beside him, and he looked sad.

"Um... Frisk?" Asriel was looking at him, concern evident in his bright eyes. "Are you okay?"

Frisk smiled regretfully. "Sorry, my thoughts went elsewhere."

"I see," Asriel looked back at the picture, not seeing more than just the two of them. "We can take it again, if you want."

Always so accommodating. Time has not taken that from you brother.

Frisk nodded. "I'd like that."

Asriel set the timer, set down the camera and jumped back onto the bed for take two.

 _Happy thoughts, Frisk. Chara, think about chocolate!_

Chocolate?

Perhaps Frisk and Chara combined had thought too many happy thoughts. Asriel had jumped off the bed to fetch the new picture with more apprehension than the first time. He cautiously peeked down at the photo. It was quite dramatic, and unnecessary. Or maybe it wasn't, as Asriel snorted as soon as he looked at the picture.

"Okay Frisk, you've got me." Asriel flicked the photo through his fingers and stretched it towards Frisk between his middle and pointer fingers. Frisk took it in his hands and laughed himself. His smile was big and goofy, closer resembling a crazed child than a kid happy to be in a picture. He had honestly meant to aim for the latter, but this was kind of funny.

Chara managed to impress the sound of a huff into Frisk's thoughts.

 _All thanks to you, partner._

Do not. Tease me. Like that.

 _Worth it._

"so, the camera's got that bed, and you two have the other?" Sans pushed out the bathroom door, a bag of ice around in his hand. He dropped it onto the floor next to the mini-fridge. "that leaves me with the bathroom then. not something a lot of people would be happy with."

"Sorry, Sans!" Asriel sputtered out, grabbing his camera off the other bed.

"you sure? i could do it. so long as neither of you get nature's call in the night." Sans kicked off his slippers and sat at the edge of the opposite bed. "she never warns you when she'll come-a knock-knocking." Sans winked. "course, she has nothing on my knock-knock jokes."

"I don't know, Sans," Frisk kicked his own shoes off and laid back in the bed. "I think Mother Nature has some great jokes. Maybe even a couple that beat yours."

"you sure about that?" Sans asked curiously. "you know me, right? i would like to hear one of these jokes."

"The platypus." Frisk answered. Sans let out a chuckle, and even Asriel laughed a tiny bit.

Fair play.

* * *

The page has ketchup stains along the margins, but is still somehow perfectly legible.

 **october 1st, 2013**

 _well. i uh... guess daily was a generous goal from the start. 'specially since i'm driving and all._

 _stopping by crater lake tomorrow as our last big stop before we reach our destination. asriel read on the road that there's some old tree in the water that's been bobbing up in down for a century. 'the old man of the lake' or something like that. very spiritual stuff. i would say he probably doesn't get a lot of visitors, but even i had heard of this place before we'd planned on the trip. so there goes that joke._

 _the only other landmark that really impressed the kids was that gateway arch in st. louis. prince got a good picture of me holding the thing up. all this nothing exceeding has me in really good shape. i should think about slowing down before i'm outdoing undyne._

 _we haven't come up with much in the way of a plan yet, other than tour the school and such. called up Muffet a few days ago and told her we were gonna be in town. heh, she offered to host us for a couple of days whilst we explore the town. frisk was a bit disappointed when I refused. not sure why, he and muffet never really came across as close. then again, this kid makes a show of loving all of us monsters._

 _i wonder if she still had that pet of hers. does she walk that thing? seeing that would would really take the (cup)cake._

In the corner of the page are is a sketch of what might be eyes. One is just a line, with large eyelashes and a twinkle coming off it. The other is a circle, shaded in entirely but for a smaller white circle. Despite the effeminate lashes, it is obviously Sans.

* * *

Max had known something was off the moment she walked in the main doors of the building. Principal Wells was standing guard at his office, talking to a familiar few sets of eyes. The monster's eyes followed Max as she turned the corner, and Max could barely muster a wave. _When was the last time I even thought about the literal monsters? I've been so busy trying to survive the figurative ones._

Every one of the staff also seemed to have some air of tension in them. While that was nothing new for the security chief, David(?). Even the janitor Sam, with all of his tender care and social awkwardness seemed odder than normal. He hadn't been feeding the squirrels when Max left the dorms that morning. And no one in the student body knew why it was.

"I bet it has something to do with that monster that was talking to Principal Wells earlier," Warren had extrapolated during lunch. Max had nodded skeptically.

"What if it's about Mrs. Hoida's absence?" She had hazarded. Warren had shrugged.

"Maybe."

Kate hadn't known either. She seemed excited and nervous all on her own, which didn't do anything to help Max's own state. When she'd tried to ask what had Kate acting up, she found herself thoroughly stonewalled. It didn't seem very much like Kate, but at a certain point even Max had to acknowledge it wasn't her business. _Even if it should all be my business._

Jefferson hadn't been waiting at the door of his room like he normally did. He had taken his seat at the front desk and spun his pen around between his fingers. _Something is definitely up._

She had been the first one in his room as normal. There was something upsetting about not having Jefferson greet her at the door as he normally did with all of her classmates. The reminder about the Everyday Heroes competition on the board added to her nerves.

Everyone else filtered into the room, ending with Victoria and Taylor's groupie saunter. Ending with an overblown flip of the hair once the rich bitch herself reached her seat. One that Jefferson was too distracted too notice.

A phone buzzed at the front of the room, and Mr. Jefferson picked it up in an instant. He looked almost relieved as he pocketed the phone and pushed himself to his feet.

"Alright. I know what you're all thinking. Good news is, Principal Wells just gave us all the go ahead to tell you what's been going on," Mr. Jefferson said. "Last night, the faculty of Blackwell were all called and told we were going to be hosting a prestigious couple of guests starting on Monday."

Max blinked. _Well that's short notice. No wonder the faculty looks so stressed. And Mrs Hoida's out for it, too..._

Already Max could see the daydreaming on everyone's faces as they tried to imagine who it was. Jefferson had paused after starting the announcement, a small smile finally cracking on his face as he drank in everyone's reactions.

"It's probably not your first guess. I'm not sure how many of you follow the news, so let's start there. As many of you know, monsters emerged from their hiding place back in May this year in Virginia." There were murmurs in the crowd, guesses of 'that skeleton ambassador,' or 'the goat guy.' Jefferson put to a stop to the guesses with an open palm."Hold all questions until the end of the story."

"When the monsters emerged, there were a few things that stood out to the first Virginians that reported seeing them. First was the epiphany that, yes, monsters are real. Second was the king that stood at their front, a... giant goat man. The third thing was the human child that followed him, alongside another two more goat like monsters. The smallest of which turned out to be the king's son. The prince of all monsters."

 _He sounds like he's reading from a script. It's so... Not like him. And he clearly doesn't enjoy it himself._

As the thought hit her, Jefferson shifted in his seat to a more casual position. Almost like he had heard it himself.

"Dramatic, right? But a monarchy don't seem to have a lot of place in our democratic system. That's why we see a skeleton on the news instead of goat people," Jefferson said with a smirk. "I don't think at any point in my greatest eighties high could I imagine saying that. Don't tell Principal Wells I said that, either."

He got a few laughs around the room, but he had them all too engaged to stop for long. _Except for Hayden, he seems like he's in his greatest millennial high right now._

"Now, I can't get into every detail about the monsters, you can do your own research on that. The point is, that prince and that human are in Oregon right now, on their way to spend a week or so in our quiet town. This King Asgore Dreemur called Principal Wells personally to ask if Wells could show his son our school," Jefferson leaned forward with a serious expression, one that was unbecoming on his face. "What we, the faculty, have to ask of you is this: behave. I'm not entirely sure how much time they'll be spending in the school itself, but I don't want to be the one to send the monster prince home with our not-so-classy high school language added to his vernacular."

The rest of the lesson became less engaging after that. _Quite the accomplishment, Principal Wells. Overshadowing even Jefferson's lessons like this._

Max honestly hadn't thought about the monsters much since meeting Muffet that first time. The news had hit hard when they first emerged, and then sunk into the back of her conscious. _Odds are, it'll be just like meeting anyone else. Except they'll have, like, horns and huge teeth or something. That still makes them less threatening than half the people I see in the hallways every day._

Hours later, she sat in her room plucking mindlessly at her guitar. It sounded a bit out of tune, but she couldn't really distinguish which string it was that was doing it. She wasn't really thinking about it. It was just noise, an attempt to drown out her thoughts.

Her phone beeped across the room. With a frown, Max put down her guitar and crossed the room. Warren's message was still lit up on her phone.

'Hey, so we've got monsters coming. You stocked up on your health potions?'

Max let out a laugh. She typed out her response quickly. 'Mana pots only. I thought you were healing?'

Her phone buzzed with his response a few moments later. 'I've always been tank, Max! Come on. Are we really going to have to find randos for the Blackwell Defense event?'

'I bet we could teach Kate to heal. Stella seems like a Warlock type, or maybe Brooke. And... Idk. Daniel as another dps, maybe?' Daniel would totally play WoW, wouldn't he?

'Eww. A lock in this expansion? Cmon. Pretty sure Brooke would be DK anyway.' Max shuddered at the thought. _Yeah, Brooke's uninvited. Though that would be scarily fitting..._

 _Would that make Nathan the Lich King? And what would that leave Victoria as? She'd probably be on Alliance, that bitch._

After a moment picturing her classmates as fantastical races, the logistics of their composition hit her. She sighed and typed in one last message.

'Welp. We're gonna wipe.'

'Well, it is just one monster. A kid at that,' Warren messaged back. Her phone buzzed again. 'Boss or not, we should be okay. Besides, look at this picture. He probably wouldn't hurt a fly.'

A picture popped as she finished the last message. The 'monster' in the picture was noticeably shorter than the robes next to him. He wore a green shirt with a series of cute, childish yellow stripes crossing his torso and sleeves. Every part of him not covered by clothing was covered by white fur. His eyes were a mystery, as he had been staring intently at the ground. His eyes and arms alike sagged tiredly. He was adorable.

She wasn't impressed by whoever took the picture though. It was taken sideways, clearly by a phone. _This is the one Warren sends me? I have standards man._

Warren was sending another message before Max could finish analyzing the picture.

'Google says its from when the monsters emerged back in April.'

'What about the human kid? Isn't he coming too?'

There was a pause. Max sat back on her couch as she waited for an answer. She could have just looked up something herself, but she figured Warren was already searching for a picture. Sure enough, another picture popped into her messages. This one was a bit better quality, less blurry and less amateurish.

The Monster Prince was in this one too, sitting on a park bench next to a young... _Boy, maybe?_ He(?) had a similar striped shirt on as the Prince, except it was blue with purple stripes. He had long brown hair that fell just below his neck and covered his forehead, and he wore a passive expression. He did look a bit happy, though. It looked like it was warmer out in this shot, and given they were eating ice cream it was easy to assume this shot was taken in the Summer. Warren confirmed as much a moment later in his description.

'Suddenly, I feel like maybe a party is overkill,' he added.

'No kidding. We're going to have to tape our mouths shut all week, lest we corrupt the youth.'

 _What was so stressful about bringing these kids in to look the school?_

* * *

There was a flash of light as Asriel snapped the photo. He flicked it a bit after he pulled it out, and together he and Frisk looked at it.

"Nice shot," Frisk said.

The lake had the slightest hint of the sun's light reflecting off it, and in that morning light it seemed all the more beautiful. Not a lot of other people had gotten up so early to see the lake. Probably because it was a weird time of year for it. Kids were all going to school, college kid were trapped between jobs and classes, and most parents knew it was too early in the year to pull them out to look at cool things. _Thanks monster mom. Totally worth it._

The islands were beautiful to look at, and Frisk especially enjoyed their names. Wizard Island was the big one, made of volcanic rocks. The other one, the Phantom Ship, did kind of resemble a boat. The guide had been very specific about the seven trees that grew on top of it, maybe like sails. It seems likely that most pirates have better seas to plunder.

The picture that Frisk and Asriel alike were most excited about didn't appear to be much. It just looked like a log, floating vertically in the water. The Old Man of the Lake was not just any old log floating vertically in the most famous lake this far in the West. Apparently, the first American explorers had found this very same log when they first found the lake, and it had been there for pretty much forever. _Can't speak for the Native Americans there._

They had gotten lucky. The tree could've been anywhere in the entirety of Crater Lake, but instead it was right there in front of them, bobbing up and down invitingly.

"He's got to have some great stories to tell," Frisk said.

"Frisk, it's just a tree," Asriel answered.

"A tree who has seen more lifetimes than me," Frisk said. He imagined Asriel could feel the meaning behind that declaration. "More than Sans. Maybe more than you, or your Dad."

In the distance on the lake, the Old Man continued to bob. He seemed to be moving closer to the center of the lake, and further from them. It was hard to tell, though. When Frisk turned to his traveling companion, Asriel's lips had sunk a bit, likely at the mention of Asgore.

"Still, it's kind of cool even just to see it. Something constant." Frisk smiled reassuringly. "Even if it won't talk."

"What do you mean?" Asriel asked.

"Well, no matter what I do, or what happens, he'll be there. I'm not going to change that." Frisk let Asriel consider this for a moment. When Asriel turned to Frisk, He looked a bit happier again. His snout twisted into a bit of a smirk when he saw that Frisk was still looking at the picture. With a sigh, Asriel handed the photo of the Old Man to Frisk, who happily pocketed it without a word.

Frisk pulled out his phone and frowned at the time it showed him.

"You think Sans is awake yet?"

"Of course not. We could totally stay out and take more pictures," Asriel said. Frisk raised a brow, and shrugged.

"Okay. I pushed out a save when we got out of the van. We should be fine to risk a few more," Frisk said.

The mountain air, combined with the chill of the lake, was a refreshing feeling. They weren't near civilization right now. Being so far away from people was relaxing. Frisk couldn't ink of the last time he had sought relative solitude like this. Even as he traversed the Underground again and again, he was never this close to literally alone. Only ever figuratively.

Up here, though, on Mount Mazama? Here was only him, and Asriel, and Sans somewhere. Maybe a park ranger was out there too, and some troublesome kids cutting school. Frisk could hear birds. Bugs. The wind. It was peaceful. Can we just never go back?

 _We have to. No one else is going to save existence._

Is existence worth saving?

 _Yes. Even you have to agree that places like this place are worth it._

One last time, Frisk looked out over the Lake. Beautiful. Chara's desire to stay must have been contagious. Frisk couldn't entirely ignore it. It did abate slightly, a pang of acquiescence edging onto him in its place.

You make a fair point. Even if I detest it.

They arrived an hour later back at the car. It was a plain thing, big enough to fit the three of them and their stuff and things. Dad had wanted to give them a trailer to stay in too, but Sans had talked him out of that with the simple reminder that he was driving. _Might have been nice, though._

The designated monster was laying back on the hood of the car, surprisingly awake and with a phone to the side of his head. Just like his brother, Sans doesn't have ears. The bone marrow shifted above above Sans's eye like an eyebrow as the kids approached.

"so, scratch that last part paps. I found 'em," Sans told the other line. A pause as the voice said something back, and Sans's smile actually widened. "course I'll pass that along bro. yeah, first thing when we get there tomorrow. yes, the car is still running. yes, both of the kids are still here. paps, i'm never gonna tell them a thing if you don't hang up. love you too, bro."

With that, Sans pulled the phone from his not-ear and shoved it into his pocket.

"What's Papyrus so excited for you to tell us today?" Frisk asked knowingly.

"he really wanted you to know he says 'hello,'" Sans said, lacking any of Papyrus's charisma. He slid off the front of the car with an elasticity not often associated with bone marrow, and landed on his pink slippers. The stench of a day's worth of ketchup and grease assaults your nostrils without mercy.

 _So dramatic, Chara._

Dead children needs hobbies. I imagine the Integrity child still does ballet in hell.

Frisk resisted frowning at that exchange as Sans sauntered up to the two of them.

"you two are late," he said plainly. "wish i'd have known you'd take your time, i would have turned off my alarm."

"You woke up for your alarm?" Frisk crossed his arms, leaned back a bit and quirked his eyebrow. One would think you do not believe him.

"don't know. slept through that part," he shrugged. "still, paps called, and that definitely woke me up. all the same, it isn't like we didn't plan for a few delays. we should still get there at time-o-clock tomorrow."

"And when we arrive?" Asriel asked. "We don't have much of a plan, do we?"

"don't we? figured you were coming up with something while you were gone."

Frisk flinched, and turned his head slowly towards Asriel hopefully. Asriel had done the same. They both turned back to Sans and shook their heads. Sans was still smiling.

"good, means we have no expectations. means we can wing it and be happy with the outcome."

"I have had a plan for everything for so long," Frisk said. He clenched his fist for dramatic effect, before pumping it into the air. "This is going to be great! Between my Determination and your guys help, we're going to improvise the best plan."

His declaration actually seemed to take Sans back. Asriel shook his head, for once being the one to keep himself composed.

"Come on, you dorks," the Prince shook his head. "Arcadia Bay awaits us."

"and the improv act of our lives, apparently," Sans opened the driver side door. "shoulda brought more than one joke book."

Frisk smirked at that. "Didn't you?"

"technicality. quantum physics ain't a joke, kid. just a useful tool for jokes."

* * *

 **Alternate title: Calm Before the Storm. 'Looking for Group' seemed more appropriately lighthearted for the contents of the chapter. Dorky enough for most of the cast, and not quite as cliche. Matches up with Max sort of finding friends, but... well, they aren't besties.**

 **Couldn't think of a way to reference the web comic by the same name within the chapter, since it's been ten years since I last looked at it.**

 **Had trouble with the finishing touches on this chapter, thus why it took an extra week to come out than the last one. I could write about places for hours, like the Crater Lake scene, but once I have to write conversations everything has to be perfect and I'm never happy.**

 **The biggest concern I had was with the 'High school drama.' By definition, it's mostly all BS, and Victoria especially is bad about that. Making said BS both in character and somewhat entertaining did nothing to speed me up. I'd had Frisk's scenes done far before I had Max's first scene finished.**

 **That quote from Andreas Feineger that I pulled up is real. Yanked straight from a Google search. Max, being in AP English, has to at least understand that backing up your claims with the word of professionals makes your case seem more valid. Smart guy, I think. Genuinely liked his pictures too, and this is coming from someone not into photography.  
**

 **Edit January 8th, 2018: fixed a couple of typos, but there are probably a bunch more out there. Mostly I'm adding this to publically laugh at my authors note. Before The Storm hadn't even been announced when I'd released this chapter. I'm pretty sure your author can see the future. Don't tell him I said that though.**


	4. Point Zero-Dot-One

**Sorry for the delay. Life got busy unexpectedly, and I kept going back and forth with myself about what to do for one part of this chapter.**

* * *

The flash seemed so different, coming from behind her. A selfie could be blinding when she forgot she had the flash on, and she knew she had a lot experience with that. With any other normal picture she could see what the camera saw at least. She wasn't sure what was bugging her specifically about his different technique.

Max stared at her wall a moment longer, taking in her work over the past week. All of her pictures in Blackwell so far had been building up to this, in a way. Despite the effort it had taken, Max had to consider again if this was really a good concept. _Is it conceited if I'm just turning in a picture of me?_

Or technically several pictures of herself. The wall in front of her was covered in them, nailed to the wall over the side of her bed. She had slept with them watching over her last night. Scenic shots of the campus, of the town. Most of them were selfies, something she hadn't really considered herself big on until she had started two weeks ago.

The idea for the photo had hit her at once. She had wanted to cover her wall in pictures anyway. Symbolically, it was all of her most important shots since arriving. _And what's more heroic than someone just living their life, in spite of how weird the world has become.?_

A look at her phone reminded her just how early it was. _5:30? It doesn't even really feel like morning._ She hadn't meant to get up so early. She couldn't fall back asleep either. Her eyes had adjusted to the low light of extra early morning quickly enough, and she made out her wall of photos.

She turned on her lamp. She brushed down her hair quickly, threw on decent enough clothes and took the shot. When the flash had hit her she froze, and turning around to look at it felt harder.

 _Okay, Max. Just look at the picture._

* * *

It has been said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. When Frisk awoke that first morning in Arcadia Bay, it seemed to be slightly less so. A small town appearing on the horizon, where even the ocean itself seemed to slumber. It didn't seem likely that any of the aquarium monsters would have swam this far since earning their freedom. And theoretically, it was to be the home to another time traveler. They hadn't shown up yet. Frisk wasn't sure if that meant their power hadn't manifested yet, or if they just hadn't arrived. Maybe they had a machine that worked on soul power. It wasn't like monsters hadn't wanted to try it before.

The hotel was small, but comfortable. Certainly a step up from the motor inns and nights on the side of the road they had been getting used to for the past couple of weeks. It sat towards the edge of town, away from the water as of a convenient place to stop for someone taking a scenic route between Seattle and California. The brochure had said as much.

It was accommodating, and the staff hadn't even looked more than twice at Frisk's company. Odds were they had been expecting monsters. _Thanks for the reservations Asgore._

Asriel and Sans were still asleep. Frisk had awoken early, generally frazzled. _Chara, did I dream last night?_ He had asked first thing.

No. You were... Restless. All the same.

He'd snuck out of bed to stretch his limbs. He could tell he feel the truth in Chara's assessment in everyone bone and muscle in his body. Returning to bed seemed like an unproductive venture. _I've already saved all the monsters and brought back the dead. What else could possibly stop me?_

I have a list.

 _I believe you._

The hotel did have one benefit though. It was slightly elevated above most of the town, and from the window Frisk could see most of Arcadia Bay. He could make out the mansion in the north, The coast to the West, and a small part of him wanted to believe he could even make out Blackwell by the coast.

The lighthouse that overlooked the town on the far cliff was especially pretty. It looked timeless. Much like the Old Man of the Lake, Frisk could believe it would always be standing there no matter what. Maybe that was just him getting sentimental in the early morning hours.

Finally, the first stirrings of life beneath the bed sheets produced the Prince of all Monsters as he sat up and stretched out immodestly on a bed meant for two. _He doesn't even share the bed sheets._

Indeed. A conceited subconscious effort on his part to lay claim to every shred of warmth on the bed. Well. Nigh every shred.

 _I'll get him to cuddle one of these days, Chara._

Gross. Somehow I forgot whom I am dealing with.

 _You love me for it._

"Frisk, are you up?" Asriel asked in a whisper.

"Yeah," Frisk answered simply. "Are you?"

"Depends what time it is." Asriel laid back on his pillow, and grasped for his phone on the drawer between the beds. He missed the first swipe, but managed to get his phone by the fourth. It lit up, showing Asriel the time. And his wallpaper.

"Golly. I guess I am up," Asriel groaned. Mournfully he slid to the side of the bed and stepped onto the floor. He was wearing a comfortable looking light green robe, with his cargo pants from the day before underneath. _Would you be wearing the same thing Chara?_

No. I don't like that shade of green.

"View's nice," Asriel said sleepily, looking past Frisk. Frisk quirked a brow and looked again.

"Probably better at sundown," Frisk answered. "You'd probably be able to get a good picture then."

Asriel nodded lazily. "You need the shower? Cuz... I want to shower."

"Go ahead," Frisk gestured to the bathroom.

He stared into town as the morning light became more and more prominent. Sans slept almost silently - given how breathing was optional for the skeleton - with only a few comical 'zzz's pronounced. Not the sound, but the letter over and over again.

It is a trend amongst the undead monster culture as they do not have lungs and can not actually snore.

 _Really? I didn't know that. All those times we got past Napstablook, and you've never told me that._

Am I correct in guessing you never asked?

Frisk shrugged. The shower started making noise in the bathroom, sputtering off the tub loudly even through the closed door. Sans started to squirm in his bed, and sat up as well. He looked at Frisk, then glanced at the kids empty bed.

"shower's not going to be free for a while then." Sans stated flatly. Frisk blinked blankly. "all that fur is gonna take a while to clean, kid."

Frisk pressed his face into his hands. He hadn't thought of that, so absorbed by the view he had been. Good job.

 _You didn't say anything either!_

This is funnier.

It was Sunday the 6th, so they didn't have anywhere to be in a hurry. According to Sans, they were going to be visiting Blackwell proper on the 7th in the afternoon as classes were about to let out. They'd meet the principal, he'd show them around the school building whilst the students were pouring out, and they'd meet some of the faculty. _Quite a tour you've arranged for us, Asgore._

Eventually Asriel left the bathroom, his poofed-out and drying fur partially hidden under his classic green striped shirt.

"morning fluffy."

Asriel looked stricken for a second, but chose not to answer sans. He found it far more productive to hide his fuming by sitting on the bed. Frisk took his turn in the shower, and emerged comparatively promptly donning his blue striped shirt. Sans did not shower, although he did manage to walk through a MTT brand cloud of cologne.

On shelves now, be the prettiest smelling robot-ghost person on your street! In your city! On the planet! Even if you're neither a robot or a ghost!

Frisk smiled at recollection of the ad.

"So, breakfast?" Asriel asked, largely depoofed. _Fire magic is rather convenient._

"yes please," Sans said. "you buying?"

"No!" Asriel declared. "I can't afford that!"

"me neither. don't think we'll be around long enough to open a tab, either."

All eyes fell on Frisk. He shrugged.

"Okay. I get to pick where we go though."

"which is?"

"I dunno, let's look around!" Sans and Asriel shared a look, and wordlessly communicated 'fair enough' with a shrug.

Arcadia Bay wasn't an especially big place. A couple square miles total. With Frisk in charge of their party, their travels brought them near the coast. The water looked calm, with barely a boat out on the water. Frisk had been kind of hoping they would have found something quickly, but there was very little in town besides a few seafood places. Asriel wasn't a fan of seafood, nor did it sound like a particularly appetizing breakfast meal.

And so many of them are closed, too.

It was by the water that Frisk finally saw somewhere that looked like it wouldn't be just sea food. A smaller diner type place, with a charming sign flashing on top.

"The Two Whales... Sounds good to me," Frisk said. He turned behind him to see Sans and Asriel creeping up behind him slowly, very obviously tired.

"okay. can do kid," Sans wiped the sweat off his skull.

"You sure? I could-"

Asriel pushed Frisk closer to the diner with a starved scowl on his snout. Frisk pushed off laughing, and stepped up the small set of stairs and opened the door to a moderate amount of noise. Morning conversations, pleasantries and the like. Sans floated in after him. As Sans thanked Frisk for the gesture, the volume of conversation lowered.

The cop at the counter seemed to take the entry of two monsters into the diner fairly well. He raised a brow, whispered something into his radio, and turned back to his dinner. The rest of the diner silenced more and more as Frisk and company took a seat by the corner of the diner.

Frisk. This was a bad idea.

One of the truckers dropped his fork as they sat down. He turned to the waitress behind the counter and started to mutter. Loudly.

"Joyce, I swear to God if there's something in my drink..."

This seemed to wake the older looking woman from her stupor. She looked at the man with great displeasure.

"As if I'd waste the effort on you," she told the man with a loud and pleasant drawl. She stepped around the counter and crossed the diner to the seat with monsters with a pad in hand.

"Sorry about that, darlins'. I'd heard the news that we were getting some... East Coast people down here, but I certainly didn't expect to be serving you." _Fair save._ "My name is Joyce, and I will be taking care of you today. Now then, can I start all of you off with a drink?

"I'll take a glass of milk," Frisk answered. She nodded, writing it down on her pad.

"Uh... Me too," Asriel followed.

"i'll take a cup o' coffee," Sans said. Frisk and Asriel stared at him wide eyed. Joyce looked equally taken back, though likely for different reasons. "four sugars."

Joyce raised a brow, and seemed like she she had a comment on the tip of her tongue. She held it back, departing with the promise of returning momentarily.

As the three of them sat there, not burning down the establishment or causing the end of the world, the conversation seemed to return throughout the diner. It started as whispers. A couple of teenagers down the way exchanging hushed excitement and glancing the trio's way. The cop kept at his breakfast. The grumpy trucker downed his breakfast ravenously, clearly hoping to get out as quickly as he could.

"You're just going to drink the ketchup anyway, why build her up like that?" Frisk raised an inquisitive brow.

"it keeps 'em guessing."

Joyce came back with their drinks, and asked to take their orders. The hot cakes sounded good enough for frisk, a gesture that Asriel seconded. Sans asked for the omelette.

"Well done?" Joyce followed up.

"yeah," Sans's smile seemed to widen slightly. "and a bottle of ketchup."

"Tends to come with the eggs, dear," Joyce said teasingly. She seemed to be getting comfortable around them. An impressive feat for most humans. She has my respect for that much.

 _Did you just compliment a human?_

...

This is _your_ doing.

Frisk's stomach made a noise that he pointedly ignored as they waited for breakfast. They sipped at their drinks in relative quiet, with only Frisk giving Sans's sugar-with-a-side-of-coffee a curious cursory glance. He was patiently sipping at it. By the time that Joyce came back with their breakfast and a smile, Sans looked slightly more awake than Frisk was used to seeing him. Only slightly.

"Your eggs, with ketchup," Joyce emphasized as she laid and Sans's plate, "and two plates of cakes for the little ones. Need me to refill your..."

"No thanks," Sans said. He plucked the ketchup bottle from the table, popped open the lid with a deft flick of his thumb, and started to chug. Joyce's face sank as the ketchup role down the chin of San's skull and onto his eggs.

"Oh come off that!" Joyce's welcoming demeanor soured in an instant. She looked at the kids, Frisk knowing he looked ready to burst. "I'm being pranked, aren't I?"

Frisk shook his head, but he was too busy trying to maintain self control to explain anything. Asriel sighed beside him. It was obviously forced.

"Golly, I'm sorry about them, mam," Asriel offered in his sweetest sounding voice. "Sans does this everywhere, and I didn't think to warn you. He really does like the ketchup that much."

Frisk looked at the Prince, and saw years of practice and discipline on the cute face he was making. Joyce's offense at Sans's tastes had to have melted even the slightest bit. She turned to the offender who was still going at the ketchup bottle.

"You're lucky you're in such good company." Joyce wagged a pen at the skeleton. Sans put down the half emptied bottle beside his half emptied coffee, and winked wordlessly.

Joyce largely left the three of them alone after that. Sans finished the ketchup and the eggs both, proof that years of effort did increase how much he could stomach without a stomach. Frisk had to finish Asriel's last hot cake, proof that he didn't want to have to carry it around in a box. When Sans paid Joyce -despite his earlier protests of 'being broke'- Frisk was sure to leave an extra couple of dollars on top of Sans's tip. _A little apology for making her the butt of Sans's joke_.

Frisk got to the door out first and held the door for his companions. Asriel thanked him politely, and a few steps behind him, Sans passed through. He nearly bumped into a decently tall girl with blue hair as she entered the diner herself, who half-heartedly told Sans 'yo, 'xcuse me skeledude' before Frisk let go of the door behind her. She glanced out the window curiously, before plastering a poster on the window.

It's a missing poster. Nothing about this strikes you as ominous.

 _Rachel Amber, missing since... April 22 this year._

Is that not about when you fell into the Underground?

Frisk made a seesaw motion with his hand, turning to catch up with the others. _I fell a couple of weeks after that. I don't think there would be any relation, anyway._

"Where to next?" Asriel asked as Frisk caught up. "We, uh... Can't really go to the school today. Can we?"

Sans shook his head. "tomorrow. got no plan for today."

Frisk nodded. "Doesn't Muffet have a shop in town?" Sans nodded. "There we go. We can go visit Muffet!"

"okay. any idea where the shop is?" Sans asked. Frisk bit his lip and shook his head.

"Right there," Asriel said plainly. Frisk followed Asriel's pointed finger to a sign just a few buildings down. Sure enough a black sign was hanging off the side of the building in the shape of a spider, baked goods hanging off of each leg. The name in the sign simply said 'Spider Sale' in a white, disconcerting font.

Ever the clever business spider.

 _I mean... Her tactics worked in the Underground._

That was on monsters. Not on humans. Humans are much less open to arachnids than monsters.

Frisk ran ahead to the door, pushing the door. It didn't budge. Frisk stared at it in confusion at the doors lack of cooperation. Sans grabbed the handle and pulled it open. He looked down at Frisk and gave him a wink. Frisk went in first.

Before she moved.

 _Huh?_

The last time we saw her. It was just before she moved.

The interior of the bakery seemed much like Frisk would have expected it, and very little like a bakery should. Reds and purples served as the most prominent colors, matching the spider donuts and cider behind the display glass. There was a spider web that stretched above the counter, with prices weaved into the web work, and photos of many of the options trapped.

Behind the counter wasn't Muffet, but a human. He looked relaxed leaning against the wall. He was playing around with his phone, and didn't seem to notice that they had entered the bakery.

"Um, excuse me?" Frisk questioned. The human's head shot up. "Um... Do you work here?"

"Yeah, last I checked," he said with a smile he turned to face Frisk curiously. Moving closer, Frisk could see his name tag read 'Trevor' in a very intricate font, just like the one in the spiderwebs.

Some Pig.

"What can I do for you, little..." Trevor's eyes fell on something behind Frisk, filled not with fear but amazement. "Holy shhhhhhh-sorry sir. Never seen a skeleton in person."

Sans returned his patented smile and shrugged.

"that's a shame. i see one everyday."

Trevor chuckled nervously at the little joke, and shot a curious glance at Asriel too.

"Oh... oh! I see now. You're those important guests that the school's all freaked about," Trevor said.

"Trevor!" A familiar voice came from somewhere behind the counter. "Stop getting friendly with the customers!"

"I know, m'am, or else I'll wake up with spiders in my bed tomorrow!" Trevor shouted back, not sounding at all dissuaded. He turned back to the trio. "Sorry, boss is a bit hardcore. What can I get for ya?"

"Spider cider!" Frisk said immediately.

"Me too," Asriel said. Trevor looked at Sans.

"i'm good."

"Cool. Two ciders coming up." Trevor said as he approached to a barrel against the wall. He grabbed two disposable cups and filled each thoroughly. He returned and handed the cups to the kids, and Sans paid for the drinks.

"So... How is it?" Frisk spoke up. Trevor raised a brow. "Working for Muffet?"

"Oh, you know her?" Trevor asked. Frisk nodded. Trevor leaned back and spoke his answer loudly. "Well I can't say I hate it. Spiders on the wall would tell the boss if I did."

A look around the shop revealed the presence of a normally uncomfortable amount of spiders in every hidden corner and crevice in the room, even a few places where there shouldn't have been room.

"Ahuhuhu, you shouldn't worry about them, Trevor!" Came the shout back. "I can hear you myself back here!"

You recognize Muffet's voice.

Trevor chuckled.

"So yeah. Pretty much just banter, plus handling the customers." Trevor said with a wink.

"And you're okay with the spiders?" Asriel asked.

"Better than that pet she keeps at her place," Trevor said with a shiver. "Glad she can't bring that down here anymore."

"sounds dangerous. and kinda surprising. she had spiders do everything back underground."

"Under...?" Trevor shook his head. "Right. Yeah. She had been doing that, but someone told her that a lot of people would prefer a more human approach. Thus..." Trevor stood back and presented himself. "Here I am."

"Can you call Muffet up her?" Frisk asked. Trevor raised a brow. "I haven't seen her in almost half a year, and I think she'd be happy to step away from her work for us."

Trevor shrugged and pushed off the counter. He nudged a door behind the counter slightly, letting the promise of fresh creamy delights waltz into Frisks senses.

"Hey boss, customer wants to talk to you," Trevor said at moderate volume.

"Again?" There was the distinct sound of metal clattering. Some instrument being put aside in haste. "What did you do this time?"

The door opened, revealing the spider's sickly-sweet smile in on duty. Every one of her arms were in motion as she walked out. She was cleaning a pan, wiping down freshly washed cookie cutters... _Is that a chess piece?._ Muffet leveled a passive stare at Trevor for a moment, and opened her mouth to address her customers. She stopped wide eyed the moment she saw just who was in her store.

"I hadn't been expecting to see you so soon," Muffet said, all of her arms stopping immediately. "I would have prepared something special."

"no need. kids wanted cider, and we just had breakfast down the street," Sans said, pointing numb vaguely in the direction of the Two Whales. Muffet's smile faltered for the smallest of moments.

"Well, I have all week to, ahem, 'weave' something," Muffet said. She looked to Sans for approval. He gave her pun a solid seesaw-motion out of ten. She didn't seem to mind, as she turned to Trevor. He gave an obviously fake 'haha.' There was a clattering in the back, causing the Frisk to flinch. Muffet sighed.

"I need to get back in the back. The other cooks have trouble with pans. It was good to see you all, even if so briefly. Enjoy your stay in Arcadia Bay, I hope to see you here again!" Muffet bowed out. With their cider in tow, Frisk and the others left the bakery. They had all day ahead of them.

A day that was evidently uneventful. They visited a couple of the landmarks around town that were open to them. They walked along the beach, feeling the cool air hit them. There was hardly a sign of life on the water but the gulls and a pair of fishing boats that kept far from each other. There was an RV parked by the water, but no one looked to be home. It would've been rude and meaningless to snoop.

There was an old statue of a rustic and pioneer-like man in a park, some ways from the beach. He was holding what vaguely looked like a Plains Native's headdress. It looked poorly taken care of. _Not to mention historically inaccurate._

They passed through the richer part of town, a reasonably sizable set of mansions for such a small town. Sans suggested it was because of Blackwell and its middling distance between West Coast cities. Frisk had only really heard much about Seattle and a couple of Californian cities.

When Sans was ready to head back to the apartment, he went alone. In spite of his apparent status as the 'caretaker' of the kids, he knew Frisk could take care for himself and Asriel. It was a morbid curiosity -in part influenced by Chara- that brought the two kids to the cemetery.

"Mariah... Joo-ar-something?" Asriel frowned. The last name was kind of faded out.

"Who-air-ez, maybe." Frisk shrugged. Spanish wasn't his best subject. _Ring any bells, Chara?_

No. Why.

 _I mean, you're from old times. She was from old times..._

I am not that old. There was a sliver of offense that tickled Frisk's funny bone.

Apparently she died in the late nineteenth century. The cemetery wasn't very large, and older tombstones were distinctly faded compared to the more recent ones. There was a girl named Carol-Ann Williams. By the years, she couldn't have been more than eighteen. There was another grave of a man named William. That one had a new bouquet of flowers on it. Etched on the stone was 'Loving father, caring husband, taken too soon.'

"How much history have monsters missed just by being trapped Underground?" Frisk wondered aloud. There was no joy in Asriel's smile.

They got home late. Sans opened the hotel room's door for them with blue magic, and was still in bed when the door closed behind them. Frisk wondered if that really was the laziest way he could have done it. The skeleton was asleep seconds later, rendering the question essentially moot.

After a long day and a restless night, Frisk slept fairly well. The only thing he could remember of his dream the next morning was the calming percussion of rain hitting a window.

* * *

Max awoke to the howling of the wind and the marching of rain.

 _Where am I? What is happening?_

It was storming. Max knew that for certain, even before she could start to gather her bearings. She opened her eyes to find her head in the dirt, muddied up by the heavy downpour. The wind was rocking the trees back and forth around her enough that looked like they might uproot. The muddied up dirt path led her further upwards. She didn't look behind her at all. Somehow, she just knew she wouldn't find anything there.

So forward she went. Question after question passed through her head. _How did I get here? Where is here?_

Through the trees, a light brightened her way. It spun far above her, a beacon. A promise of shelter, of safety. Max a twig passed by Max's head, and she picked up her pace. The trail got steeper just before she hit the clearing, her eyes not leaving the lighthouse for an instant. As she left the cover of the trees, the wind got stronger, and the wind battered her all the more. An absent thought went towards the well-being of the photos she had in her bag, but when she reach at her side, her bag was gone.

 _Must have lost it somehow... It doesn't matter now. I need to get to the lighthouse._

She reached the door of the lighthouse and tried to pull it open. It was locked. Desperately, Max tried to pull it open. _No! Please!_

"Anyone! Let me in!" She shouted, her voice barely even registering as her own through her fear.

But nobody came.

 _Fuck. Okay, Max. It's just a little..._

Max turned to look out into the bay. Death danced just off of the shore, a twister of inevitability that she somehow missed. Debris went every way, into and around the tornado. Max could only look on in horror. She grabbed the star on her wrist, wishing desperately to be anywhere else but here.

A fishing boat flew past Max's head, crashing into the lighthouse tower and flying further down the cliff she had just climbed. The lighthouse was damaged badly.

There was a breaking sound as stone fell upon stone. The light of the lighthouse snapped off, leaning towards where she stood her. Max backed away, but she couldn't run away in time. The light began to fall. Just before it landed on her, the world flashed. Just as quickly the world went black and all noise stopped. In that silence, Max heard a voice. A familiar promise that came with no name.

"Chin up, okay bestie? I'll see you later."

...

Max's head shot up off her desk, the light of the classroom hurting her eyes. Jefferson was in the center of the room, delivering his lecture just as he had been when Max... Fell asleep? _That was so surreal._

"Alfred Hitchcock famously called film, little pieces of time but he could be talking about photography, as he likely was."

A paper ball flew across the room, hitting Kate Marsh in the side of the head. It was easy to guess who threw it, considering the sadistic smile on Taylor's face.

 _Okay... I'm in class. It's okay. You're okay Max._

A phone started to vibrate loudly on the next table over. It was a jarring sound, and the phone's owner Victoria barely gave it a thought.

"These pieces of time can frame us in our glory and our sorrow; from light to shadow; from color to chars curl... Now can you give me an example of a photographer who perfectly captured the human condition in black and white?"

"Diane Arbus," came the answer from Max's left.

"There you go, Victoria! Why Arbus?"

"Because of her images of hopeless faces. You feel like, totally haunted by the eyes of those sad mothers and children," Victoria said.

"She saw humanity as tortured, right?" Mark Jefferson shook his head. "And frankly, it's bullshit. Shh, keep that to yourselves. Seriously though, I could frame any one of you in a dark corner and capture you in a moment of desperation. Isn't that too easy? Too obvious? What if Arbus chose to capture people at the height of their beauty or innocence? She had a brilliant eye..."

Max couldn't concentrate. Her thoughts kept returning to her nightmare. _It was so real. I was absolutely certain that I was going to die._

She needed to calm down. Something, anything to bring her back to a sense of normality. It wasn't to be found in Jefferson's lecture...

There. She grabbed her camera, and laid it in her lap facing her. There was a buzz as the camera dispensed the picture for her to see. The buzz was made all the louder by the deafening silence of the room. Max looked up to see Jefferson staring right at her. _Right. I'm in class._

 _Nice one, dumbass._

"I believe Max has taken what you call a selfie," he began, calling even more attention to her action. "A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Max... has a gift. Of course, as you all know, the photo portrait has been popular since the early 1800's. Your generation was not the first to use images for selfie expression."

There was a small pause, and Max would've probably cracked a smile if every one of her social anxieties weren't tearing her asunder at that moment.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist. The point remains that the portraiture has always been a vital aspect of art, and photography, for as long as it's been around." He shot his gaze back at Max, and she was trapped like a deer in the headlights. "Now Max, since you captured our interest and clearly want to join the conversation, can you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self portraits?"

Max blinked at him, racking her mind for the answer. _Come on, brain. Please work with me here. I know I've read this part..._

 _The answer came to you in a flash! Actually, it didn't, but damn would it have been nice._

"I... Did know it..." Max mumbled. Mr. Jefferson slapped his hand against the nearest table.

"You either know this or not, Max. Is there anybody here who knows their stuff?"

When the answer came, Max was tempted to bury her head in the ground.

"Louis Daguerre was a French painter who created 'daguerreotypes', a process that gave portraits a sharp reflective style, like a mirror," Victoria recited perfectly. She turned to Max with a superior smile on her face. "Now you're totally stuck in the Retro Zone. Sad face."

 _Victoria's jeers slide off you painlessly. Like water off a mirror. Laid flat on the ground._

Max frowned.

"Very good, Victoria," Jefferson said. "The Daguerreian Process brought out fine details in people's faces, making them extremely popular from the 1800's onwards. The first American daguerreotype self-portrait was done by Robert Cornelius. You can find out all about him... In your textbook. Or even... Online."

 _Gasp! Who would have thought!_

The bell rang at that moment, and the students were immediately a twister of activity gravitating towards the door as soon as their school supplies were together. Max put away her camera and slid a photo on her table under her journal as possible as soon as Jefferson started trying to rush through his last announcement. A reminder that their 'Everyday Hero' shots were due this week.

"So Stella and Alyssa, get it together. Taylor, don't hide, I'm still waiting for your entry too." Jefferson turned to look straight at Max as she was halfway out of her seat. "And yes Max, I see you pretending not to see me."

 _So no mutant powers today, then._

Despite how on edge she felt, the little joke did make her smile a little bit.

Victoria was talking to Jefferson at the front of the room. Kate was still in her chair, memorizing the details of her table. _What happened there? Sure, Kate hasn't been all smiles as long as I've known her, but..._ Everybody else had filtered out of the room.

A part of Max wanted to say something to Kate. At the same time, Max herself was feeling like a mess. _What could I possibly say to her that would make her feel better about... Whatever it is that's eating at her?_

 _Nothing comes to mind.  
_

Max gave Kate a glance as she walked by her. She spared at glance at a carving in the table opposite hers. 'RACHEL AMBER 4EVER' with a heart in the middle. Max hadn't really thought much of it the first time she noticed it, but... _It's hard not to think about her, considering her missing posters are everywhere._

Max hoped to slip out from the classroom without a peep, but fate wasn't going to let it happen.

"Where do you think you're going, Max?" Jefferson asked. Max froze, her hand on the door handle. With a sigh, Max accepted her fate and turned to face her fate. Victoria looked just as surprised, since her flirting had evidentially been cut off. "I'd never let one of photography's future stars avoid handing in her picture."

 _Right. Like it's worth anything._

 _"_ I didn't have any time, too much homework.

Jefferson shook his head, not buying her excuse in the slightest. Jefferson looked through her, his disappointment piercing her skull.

"You're a better photographer than a liar, Max," Jefferson said. Max grabbed her wrist, and endured a lecture from her teacher and hero on seizing the day, all while Victoria watched with a clouded expression. _The whole school is going to know about this in an hour._

Finally, Max was allowed to leave the room. She leaned against the wall by the door and people watched for a moment. Ms Grant had been leaving her science classroom, and was heading towards the office with a clipboard in hand. Juliet was talking to a guy named Zach from the football team. It was all the picture of a perfectly boring high school, devoid of the destruction she had just dreamed up.

 _Welcome to the real world..._ Max pulled her phone from her bag and plugged in a pair of earbuds. The music started as she put the buds into her ears. _I need a serious time out in the bathroom._

The world wasn't even noise anymore, since she couldn't hear anything past the music. The only thing that caught her eye as she hurried down the hallway as calmly as she could was a couple of bigger guys cornering Daniel against his locker. A part of Max wanted to step in and punch the bigger player, Logan, across the jaw. Another part of her knew she could never bring herself to do it.

Max had almost made it to the bathroom when she saw a larger clump of students gathered around something by the main entrance of the building. Curiosity dug into her, and Max was part of the circle before she even knew it, with one earbud freed from its canal and enjoying the nonexistent breeze.

"you'd think they've never seen a skeleton before," an unfamiliar voice joked as soon as max could hear. Max couldn't see around the students yet, but she didn't need to see the speaker to notice that he sounded wrong.

"Forgive me for this, Mr... Uh, Skeleton?" Principal Wells said. He sounded a bit overwhelmed. "We don't see a lot of monsters around here."

"don't worry about it, princi-pal. i'm good at working a crowd and the kids behind me are used to being in front of much bigger crowds than this." Max finally found a window and saw at last the fabled guests that Blackwell was hosting.

The one that was speaking was a skeleton. Max remembered seeing a taller one on television back when the news first came out that monsters existed. That one had been animated and wide eyed. The one she saw now was a foot shorter than her at least and covered his chubby bones with a hoodie, shorts, and flattering pair of pink slippers.

Behind him were two kids in striped shirts that looked to be about half of Max's age. _At least, the human definitely looks ten._ The other kid looked like a goat. She recognized them from the pictures Warren had sent her. Frisk and Asriel.

 _I don't think they're carrying any worthwhile raid boss loot._

Max turned on her heels and walked away. She wasn't feeling up to the excitement right now. _They'll be here all week. I could probably get a picture with them at some point, if I really want to._ She made a beeline for the girl's bathroom and went inside. Her music was still playing in one ear.

She removed her earbud, putting it in her pocket. The bathroom was incredibly dull, with lights that barely lit up the room. It was made more miserable by the damp air. No one else was in there with her. _No one else has to see me breakdown._

Max leaned over the sink and looked at herself in the mirror. If not for the pounding of her skull being written all over her eyes, she might not have even looked like something was wrong. Her hair looked a little out of place, and she lost a little bit of her color, but other than that...? _It's just me. Just Max._

Max frowned, and turned on the sink. A cold splash of water later, she felt a little bit more like she existed. _You're cool, Max. Just a nightmare. In the middle of the day. You're just spooked._

Her talk with Jefferson came to her. She pulled out the picture she had taken for the Everyday Heroes contest. It was her in the foreground, her back to the camera. The focus of the shot was on the wall she was facing, lit up in the early morning by a lamp just outside of the shot. All over the wall were shots she had taken throughout the campus. Some with her. Some of scenery. Some of people living their lives.

 _Fuck it._ Max tore the photo in half. It would've been conceited to turn in a picture of herself for the contest. She wasn't a hero.

A blue flutter in the corner of her eye caught her attention. Max turned to her left to see a butterfly flying into the bathroom through the vent. It fluttered behind the bathroom stalls. Curious, Max followed it around the corner. It landed on a bucket in the corner, a lively blue to the otherwise muted colors of the bathroom.

 _It's not every day you get a photo op like this._

Max pulled out her camera and aimed her camera at the bucket, leaving the butterfly just off center but still whole in the picture. The click of her camera startled the bug, and it flew away to perch itself on a sink by the vent.

Max caught her photo as it slid out of her camera. It was pretty good, she had to admit.

The bathroom door flew open and closed hard behind whoever came in. Max pressed herself against the side of the last stall. Max could hear them muttering to themselves, but she was hidden behind the stalls. She peaked around the corner to see someone pacing back in forth.

"Don't be scared... You own this school..." The boy leaned over the sink and addressed his reflection. "If I wanted, I could blow it up... You're the Boss."

The door opened again, and Max stepped back into cover. _What the fuck is Nathan Prescott doing in the girl's bathroom? Hold up, what was that about blowing up the school?_

"So what do you want?" Nathan asked. He sounded more certain of himself, but he was still audibly shaken.

Max could hear stall doors opening as Nathan's accomplice spoke. Max couldn't place her voice. _Do I know her?_

"I hope you've checked the perimeter, as my step-ass would say." Evidently satisfied that they were alone, the girl stopped her sweep just short of finding Max's hiding spot in the corner. "Now, let's talk bidness."

 _The English language is not your toy._

Feeling it was safe to look, Max peeked around the corner again. Nathan was stilling staring straight into his reflection. The girl reminded Max of a vulture, dressed in black and circling something broken. Except vultures didn't have blue hair.

"I got nothing for you," Nathan asserted.

The girl grabbed onto the sink and got close to Nathan's face.

"Wrong. You got hella cash."

"That's my family, not me." Nathan shook his head.

"Oh boo hoo, poor little rich kid. I know you've been pumpin' drugs n' shit to kids around here..." Max could feel the girl's smile in her voice. One that screamed Nathan was cornered, and they both knew it. "I bet your respectable family would help me out if I went to them. Man, I can see the headlines now."

"Leave them out of this, bitch."

"I can tell everyone that Nathan Prescott is a punk ass who begs like a little girl and talks to himself!"

The gun came out then. The world seemed to slow down as the roles reversed, and the girl was now the one who was cornered by Nathan with a gun, and Max was frozen in place unable to do anything about it.

"You don't know who the fuck I am or who you're messing around with!"

"Where'd you get that? What you doing? Come on, put that thing down!" The girl had her back against the wall, and Nathan was edging closer waving the gun around.

 _You can't just watch, Max... Think of something! She could die!_

 _What the fuck do I do?_

"Don't ever tell me what to do." Nathan had the gun pressed against the girl's stomach. "I'm so sick of people trying to control me!"

 _Come on, Max! Go!  
_

"You're going to get in hella more trouble for this than drugs," the girl said. .

"No one would even miss your punk ass, would they?" Nathan was seething, his finger on the trigger. _  
_

Max stepped out from her cover too late, as the girl made an attempt to break free.

"Get that thing away from me, you psycho!"

 **Bang.**

"No!" Max screamed, reaching out. Nathan dropped the gun. The girl was falling, a red stain over her stomach. It all happened in slow motion, or Max would have sworn. And then it stopped, and the world rushed by in a blur.

"Get up girl, we've got plans to make."

Max's head shot up off her desk, the light of the classroom hurting her eyes. Jefferson was in the center of the room, delivering his lecture just as he had been when Max had first awoken from her nightmare.

 _What the fuck._

* * *

Frisk stumbled on the stair. Blackwell Academy was towering over them, an impressive sight. He could see the photographs that were on display in large cases around the fountain. If he turned around, he would seeing the sun lowering.

"hey kid, you okay?" Sans asked. Frisk looked back up the stairs to see Sans and Asriel looking back at him with obvious concern.

Frisk brought his hand to his head, feeling the dull throb. It was a familiar pain, one he knew would go away in a couple of minutes once his Soul grounded itself in this timeline they were in. It didn't last too long, so it couldn't have been too big a jump. But it _hurt._

Frisk. That was a weighty jump. How far ahead did you come from?

Frisk's cycled through his memories of what was about to occur. They were going to step inside the school, and meet the principal -or princi-pal, as Sans was calling him- Wells. Really, Wells mostly talked to Sans about stuff, history things about the school that Frisk didn't listen to the first time. The bell would ring, but they would still be talking to Wells in the hallway. There was a crowd of students around them, which Wells apologized for.

 _The last thing I remember, Principal Wells was taking us to see the photography teacher after Asriel asked, and then..._

There had been a bang, and the next thing Frisk knew he was on the steps again.

Frisk?

"Frisk?" Asriel asked. Frisk had forgotten he was standing on the stairs. "What's wrong? You've got that look about you like..." Asriel's eyes widened. "Does something bad happen in there?"

"I don't know." Frisk said. His calm was manufactured. "I didn't bring us back here. **"**


	5. Take Two

"so, uh... guess that means our time traveler mark duex is here then," Sans said. Frisk could feel the frown marks on his face. Sans ignored them, if he noticed them at all. "remember anything that might lead us to them?"

Frisk's head still hurt a bit, a throbbing ache that reverberated down his inner skeleton and into his Soul.

"We met the principal, talked to him for a bit. A bunch of students were crowding us, and you made a joke about it. The last thing I remember before we came back was that we were walking down the hall to meet one of the teachers and..."

Bang.

"There was a... a gunshot, maybe?" Frisk's eyes went wide. Which for him, was just slightly more open than a thin slit. "Seconds before time jumped. There was a-"

His head hurt again, and he closed his eyes.

"-ember anything that might lead us to them?" Sans finished asking when Frisk's eyes opened. Frisk rubbed at his head.

"They just jumped again," Frisk groaned. "I just explained this... This is going to be annoying."

The smallest sympathetic smile appeared on Asriel's face. _Right, he'd know a thing or two about being in this situation, wouldn't he?_

Flowey had had enough Determination in him to recall most timelines. Did he get this headache every time you reset? Every time you loaded?

 _Yeah, that._

"that's a shame. much as I want to tan my bones though, perhaps we'd better get a move on?" Sans nudged his elbow in the direction of the school. Frisk blinked at the change. As if Sans would keep things consistent. "give us a quick rundown."

"We meet the principal, get crowded by students, and go to meet one of the teachers. There was a loud bang, like a gun, and then time reset," Frisk repeated as they approached the front doors.

Blackwell's courtyard was a pretty impressive to behold. The stairs up to the yard itself made it appear taller than anything else in the immediate area, an impression that made it appear above the rest of the town. Whilst a few parts of the Arcadia Bay had ranged from rural to somewhat suburban to rundown, Blackwell transcended those descriptors.

The courtyard was centered by a statue of a man standing tall, watching over the stairs. The plaque on the statues front read 'The future needs excellence. -Jeremiah Blackwell.' _If we ever reach the future._ Jeremiah was circled by a few display boards of enlarged photographs. At the statue the path split in four ways. Behind them the path would lead them off of the campus. To the right was the student dormitory. To the left was...  They have an indoor pool. That sounds lovely right now.

And of course the main building was straight ahead. It wasn't very large. Frisk's school in Ebott had been huge. Blackwell was infinitesimally cleaner looking. Instead of the fresh smell of graffiti, -graffiti that ranged from tags to bad jokes to off-color remarks on monsters- Blackwell was smelled of mortar, brick, cut grass, and was only marked by some graffiti. The main building extended both ways and turning a bit into the yard at each end. At its center was the school bell tower, watching over Arcadia Bay and the campus as a guardian should.

Morning in the Bay, Arcadia 'wakes to the Bell of Blackwell... The singsong nature of Chara's commentary gave Frisk pause.

 _Nah, doesn't fit the melody you're going for._

I know. I had an opportunity to lord my taste in film over you.

 _Sorry Chara, but I still hold that The Lion King is better._

The next thought that Chara sent towards Frisk resembled less words or emotions, but rather the sound of a raspberry in his ear. Asriel turned to raise a brow, and Sans raised the marrow above his eye. Frisk just shrugged. They climbed the stairs and Sans pressed the buzzer at the door.

Frisk blinked as they did so. When he opened his eyes an instant later, they were at the bottom of the stairs and his head ached again. He smacked his hand into his face.

 _This is going to get old fast._

* * *

 _I can control time._ It was a strange thought. One that normally the brain would recognize, consider with humor, and then discard after a moment's revelry of the what-ifs. Or that got its recipient locked into a mental ward for their safety and the safety of others.

And yet, Max was certain of it beyond a doubt. A scientist's duty was to find proof, experiment, and such. _Warren would be all over that..._

Max was hardly what one would call a scientist. She was a photography student from Arcadia Bay Oregon. That was her only gift. She always did terrible in her science classes, working until she dropped to just barely eek out a C. She wasn't even that great of a student period outside of a few classes.

Now she was... What, a superhuman? She was certainly not a superhero. She didn't even have some tragic backstory, nor had she had any contact with nuclear waste. Yet the proof of her power was as clear to her as it possibly could be. _I should..._

Who could she tell? Warren might believe her... She absolutely couldn't keep this entirely to herself. Kate wouldn't believe her, and neither would Dana. Or... There wasn't anybody else she really could approach with this besides her parents, and that really wasn't a rabbit hole she felt like diving into. _Warren it is then._

She had awoken in the classroom after watching someone get shot in the bathroom, five or ten minutes before it had happened. She had thought it was just another dream, an extension of her nightmare of the tornado hitting Arcadia Bay. And yet, everything happened exactly the same. Taylor threw a ball of paper at Kate Marsh. Jefferson was giving his lecture about self-portraits. Victoria's phone started to buzz. Same order, same sequence, just as fast. It was deja vu to the extreme if extreme was spelled with capital letters and played with amateur video editor effects.

Max could have jumped out of her skin. Perhaps worse, her jump knocked her camera off her table. It broke into several pieces around her. Taylor nudged at Victoria and pointed her towards Max misfortune. Their smug expressions made Max's blood boil.

It should have been a travesty. That camera was her life, and in it was her hopes and dreams. It was the perfect first test. She had reached out her hand, and time froze for a second. Then everything moved backwards for her, a specter of her getting startled backwards in her place. Jefferson had walked backwards, Daniel across the room had erased part of his sketch with the point of his pen. The camera reassembled and fell upwards, landing gently back on the table.

She lowered her hand, and Jefferson resumed his lecture from half a sentence earlier. Max wasn't listening hard at all. If someone were to look at her, they would surmise that the palm of Max's hand was the most interesting thing in the world.

 _I'm a human time machine._

"Diane Arbus." Victoria answered. Max looked up. She and Jefferson had a back and forth about Arbus, culminating in Jefferson declaring that Arbus's photographic philosophy was bullshit. _Apparently, so are the laws of space and time._

"Seriously though, I could frame any one of you in a dark corner, and capture you in a moment of desperation. And any one of you could do that to me. Isn't that too easy? Too obvious? What if Arbus instead chose to capture someone at the height of their beauty, or innocence..."

 _Don't freak out. Max..._ She looked over at her camera.

 _If everything happens the same... Then..._ Max grabbed her camera, turned it to face herself, and took a photo. Jefferson immediately shushed the room, a smile on his face as he called her out again.

"I believe that Max has just taken what you kids call a "selfie"... A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Max... has a gift."

 _It's real. I'm not dreaming this. Then...-_

The gunshot reverberated in her memory.

 _That girl may still be alive. I can still save her!_

"Your generation is not the first to use images for selfie-expression. Sorry."

The pun earned a few chuckles. Max had thought it was only passable the first time, though slightly funnier because it was Jefferson saying it. Sigh and such, she didn't have time for that line of thoughts.

 _I have to get to the bathroom... Maybe if I left now, I could-_

"Now Max, since you've captured our interest and clearly want to join the conversation, can you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self portraits?"

Max had used a lame excuse to try and weasel out of it, earning a talking to after class... Which would have meant she wouldn't get down the hall in time to save the girl. Victoria gave Jefferson the answer he had wanted instead, just like the first time. Louis Daguerre, French guy, daguerreotypes. Max's eyes widened and it seemed obvious what she should do. She raised her hand, and time went backwards.

"Now Max, since you've captured our interest and clearly want to join the conversation, can you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self portraits?"

"The Daguerreian Process." Max answered immediately. She paused, recollecting Victoria's answer. _That girl knows her stuff, drama queen or not._ "Invented by a French painter named... Louis Daguerre. Around... 1830."

Her heart was aflutter when Jefferson smiled and complimented her answer. That could have also just been the time travel increasing her blood pressure, and the fact she could do it at a whim.

The bell rang, and Jefferson dismissed them with a reminder to submit their photo for the Everyday Hero contest. Max to a guilty look at the photo she had taken. She still wasn't satisfied with it. _And if I changed anything else, well, my timing may be off._

Max took a look at Kate and felt guilty to be leaving without saying anything to her. She still looked upset about something but...

The shortest distance between two points was a straight line, and Max made one for the door. As she grabbed the handle, Jefferson stopped her.

"Don't even think about leaving here until we talk about your entry."

With a sigh, Max marched over to Jefferson, much to Victoria's dismay. He gave her the same spiel as the first time. It was... Almost tedious to live it again

"I'm not avoiding, just..." Max couldn't think of the words. _I have somewhere to be..._

"Biding time, waiting for the elusive 'right moment?'" Jefferson hadn't made the air quotes but by the tone of his voice they were heavily implied.

"Exactly," Max had said. She had halfway pivoted towards the door when Jefferson shook his head.

"Max, don't wait too long," he adjusted his glasses and leaned back. Max could hear Victoria's nails rapping against Jefferson's desk. "John Lennon once said that 'Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans.'" He flourished a hand toward the door, his lips curved down. "Go on now, don't let me stop you."

 _Now Jefferson is disappointed in me... But I don't have the time to..._

Max blinked, and her hand shot up. Jefferson leaned forwards, his mouth moving without sound. Victoria's rapping nails were noiseless as they flowed back in time with her, cultivating in her arms resolving under her chest which hung over Jefferson's desk. Max's hands lowered, and the conversation between Jefferson and Victoria resumed.

"Excuse me, Mr. Jefferson?" Her eyes flicked to the clock as Victoria chastised Max. A chastisement that Jefferson returned. His attention was all on Max. _Hook_

"I'd never let one of the photography's future stars avoid turning in her picture," he had said. The same as every other time they had had this talk. The words lacked the weight it had the first time she had heard them. Max's vertebrae were stacked, and she met Jefferson's eyes.

"I'm on top of it." Jefferson's brows quirked. _Line._ "I think John Lennon once said that 'life is what happens when you're busy making other plans.'" _Sinker_

The pride of a mentor sparkled in his eyes and smile alike. Max could almost forgive herself for thinking of fishing. Arcadia Bay had enough fishing in it without her nautical thoughts.

"Max, you are one fire today. All the right answers. Good. Make sure you're done working on it by today. I have faith in you."

He had turned back to the rapping fingernails of Max's classmate. Max left the classroom with a stride she hadn't had the first time that she left it that day. The sounds of conversation tapped against her ear.

Reality had been catching up with her thoughts again, but in the here and now she didn't have a moment to waste.

 _Walk down the hall._

Dana and Zachary were flirting by the door. Daniel was being pinned by Logan down the hall. Samuel was sweeping in the lobby. A number of her classmates were crowded around the monsters and the human with them. Max didn't stop for them.

 _Enter the bathroom._

She leaned over the sink. Water was splashing against her face a second later.

 _Tear up the photo._

 _Butterfly enters through the vent._

 _It lands on the bucket._

 _Take the shot._

The door slammed open.

* * *

Sans pressed the buzzer on the door. They waited for a moment. The breeze brushed them by, whistling by Frisk's ear. It carried the smell of ketchup on it, and Frisk became aware for the second time in that cycle of events how poorly Sans was practicing hygiene for what should be an important event. They waited a moment until a voice greeted them through the machine.

"Hello, how can we help you?" The voice was female, and sounded wholly unwelcoming.

"hey, name's sans. sans the skeleton. me and the kids here were scheduled to see what there is to see." There was a brief pause filled inky by static, and then the door clicked in front of them.

"The door is unlocked, Principal Wells will meet you in a minute in the lobby just inside." Instructions given, the disembodied voice disconnected. The door's lock clicked, allowing them inside.

They stepped inside. After how grandiose the exterior of the school had been, the inside was remarkable typical. The office was next to the main entrance of the school. There was a shelf at the start of the hall to their left, with football trophies and other such things. Frisk had admired them the first time. Asriel looked at him, then back at the trophies curiously. Frisk shrugged, and followed the Prince over. They were not as interesting the second time. He looked at newer things that he hadn't seen the first time, a habit Frisk had grown very fond of. Sans seemed content to lean against the wall by the office.

Asriel took in each trophy curiously. A couple of times he reached towards his pocket, his paw stopping, and his face turning downwards for a moment.

"What's wrong?" Frisk asked. Asriel jumped a bit. Sheepishly, the goat turned with a baaaa-shful smile on his face.

"Well... I can't decide if I should take a picture or not," Asriel rubbed the back of his head like the adorable monster he was. "They look nice, and I know I could get cool picture, but..." Frisk gave Asriel a patient smile. "It's not my accomplishments on display here."

Frisk raised a brow. It made sense in a way, but that kind of thought had never stopped him before. They had passed a number of landmarks that were just as much on display as these trophies, if a bit more open. Those had taken a lot of work to put together too.

"You're taking pictures for you, right?" Frisk asked. Asriel thought on this, and nodded. "Then take the pictures you want to take. You're not hurting anyone."

Frisk heard the sound of a door opening behind the two of them. When he turned around, instead of seeing the principal as he knew it too be, he was blinded by the light of a thousand suns. Frisk's eyes adjusted to the light in a moment, as it was only the light overhead reflecting off a bare cranium. He isn't as bald as Sans. Sans does not even have skin to be bald with.

He stood high above all three of them, large of belly and dark of skin. His figure stood high, disciplined to the point that Frisk felt his own back straighten out in hopes of even starting to match it. Sans did nothing of the sort of course. The light no longer blinding him, Frisk could see the principal's mouth was a straight line before he saw them.

"Good afternoon. I take it you're Mister... Um... The Skeleton, Mister Dreemurr, and Mister..." The principal trailed off looking at Frisk. Frisk had done these introductions before, this wasn't a surprise this time.

"Frisk is fine, sir." Frisk connected his hands at his stomach and gave a little bow. That turned the man's passive expression into a smile.

"Very well then, Mister Frisk. I am Raymond Wells, the principal of Blackwell Academy," he gave a little nod aimed at all of them. "It is my pleasure to welcome all of you to Blackwell Academy, and by extension to Arcadia Bay."

Sans shrugged, and extended his hand. Asriel's eyes beside Frisk went wide as Wells reached for it.

"the pleasure is mine, princi-pal," Sans replied. It was an uneventful handshake, devoid of the sounds of flatulence. Wells grimaced as their hands parted, shaking his hand behind his back a bit as if to fling away something disgusting. Like grease.

And probably because touching living -if magical- bone is very disconcerting the first time you do it. Wells looked straight at Frisk after doing it and grimaced.

The school bell rang out at that moment. They really were cutting it close with their timing, weren't they?

"so wells, we all read a bit on the school before we came here, but perhaps you could give us a bit of a refresher before we go anywhere?"

"Of course I could, Mr. Skeleton-"

"just sans is fine. mr. skeleton is my bro." Sans winked in the kid's direction. Wells frowned, but nodded. The four of them were in a circle by the office, the footsteps of student approaching them. It was all very familiar. Frisk had learned patience a long time ago. Well, also only about six months ago... Time travel was confusing.

"Very well... Sans. Think back to your history books, to a century... Ago..." Wells winced. His prepared speech was not valid for monsters. _Smooth._ He dragged his hand down his face. "Right, sorry. I use that speech so often I don't even think about it."

Frisk shrugged. Sans shrugged. Asriel probably shrugged simply by association. Frisk turned to make sure, and yeah. Goat shrugged. Frisk turned back to Wells curiously. They hadn't had this conversation the first time around. _As always, Sans changes it up._

"Arcadia Bay, one hundred years ago, was home to two groups of people. American citizens who wanted to get as far from the East Coast as possible, and the local Natives. Whilst both groups had several communities around the area, Arcadia Bay was the one place that both groups could call a home." Principal Wells's face was turned out the main doors. The setting sun wasn't visible through the door yet, but Frisk imagined that it would be a pretty sight in an hour or so.

"Blackwell's founder, Jeremiah, knew Arcadia Bay had to grow, had to push into the future. That everyone had to be a part of that future. Jeremiah made a deal with the natives to build his school on their ground. It welcomed students from both groups, and continues to search out the brightest and most talented from all walks of life across the country. For the hundreds years since, Blackwell Academy has stood at the forefront of both the arts and the sciences. A future that I'm proud to play even a small part in, and I hope that both of the kids I see before me will be joining in a few years."

Wells speech done, Frisk started to clap. No one else was clapping. Frisk stopped clapping. Wells seemed to beam all the same. Frisk looked around to see they were starting to get a bit of a crowd around them. One that was surprisingly respectful and quiet. Or perhaps they were just amazed.

"That was pretty cool," Asriel said. "Can you tell us more?" He actually bounced a bit in anticipation.

Wells shook his head. "I'm afraid not. Ms. Grant knows even more of the local history than me. She teaches science classes just down the hall."

Frisk's attention drifted from Wells as he looked around the crowd. So far it looked mostly the same as it had the first time around. Since Wells finished his history speech, the students had started whispering. Curiosities mostly. The girls who thought they were quiet in the back said the worst things, mostly about Sans's hoody of all things. Disgusting leeches.

Frisk couldn't tell if something was different amongst them. If their time traveler was even in Blackwell, he couldn't even trust that any changes were just their fault. Even besides Sans, the universe itself changed up the timeline on its own sometimes. Just for the fun of it. La la la.

 _Yeah yeah, beware the man who speaks in whatever. Over it._

"Speaking of down the hall," Principal Wells continued, "with classes out we could start our tour now. Mark Jefferson is our photography teacher, and I seem to recall hearing that our Prince here was a fan." Asriel smiled bashfully.

The pitch of Wells's voice went slightly higher as he addressed Asriel as one would address an infant. Frisk might not have noticed it if he wasn't listening so hard. And if time hadn't rewound again just after Wells spoke, causing him to repeat himself. Frisk rubbed his forehead.

I detest this new time traveller. Even I can feel that one. At least Asriel didn't seem offended.

Wells waved the gathered the already waning crowd away. The rest of them had likely decided that they had better things to do.

An impression of a huff followed Frisk down the hall. A few students were still lingering in the halls chatting away. They went silent as they passed, turning to hushed whispers for their gossip in their wake. Wells approached one classroom door in particular and reached for the handle.

He stopped when a siren blared out through the halls, just short of the opening the door. Frisk nearly jumped out of his skin at the sudden shrill, and not for the sake of matching Sans. A series of lights flashed all the way down the hall.

"Are you... Of course this would happen now," Principal Well growled. He turned to his tour group. "I'm sorry, we will need to have our tour again some other time. If you could step outside, I need to deal with this."

Sans shrugged, and turned on his heel back down the hall. A number of students were running towards the door.

"Don't run in the halls! Your asses wil get out just fine walking!" Some man yelled from near the lobby. He looked like he was wearing a security outfit.

Frisk and Asriel followed Sans back into the lobby. They looked like they were the last ones out with the exception of one last student hobbling out. Does he look hurt to you?

 _Yeah. Might have gotten startled and bumped something hard._

Right. What happened to your gunshot?

Frisk didn't know.

"Something's changed," Frisk said to his companions. "The alarm didn't go off last time."

Sans just nodded. Asriel looked grim.

Where not even ten minutes ago in a consistent time stream they had been alone in the school's yard, now it was swarming with activity. Students were all over the yard chatting with each other about their school day. One boy was setting up with a sketch pad. Another was looking over photos. The three of them descended the stairs, catching the attention of several students.

"If they're already changing things, then they know they have their power," Asriel said. "What if they know we're hunting for them?"

Sans shrugged. "Then we simply look for the person avoiding us. A just as good question is what if they don't?"

"Look out!" A voice interrupted. Sans stepped marginally to his right without looking - contrary to the instructions he received - and avoided a drone that passed through the air his skull had just been. For half a second, Frisk was scared. Sans's pupils disappeared. They were back immediately as a girl with black hair with a red highlight ran up to them.

"Oh my god, you need to watch where you're walking!" She told Sans. Frisk blinked. "You were right in my flight path, and I could have hit you!"

"yeah. you could have. glad to know it would've been my fault too. very important," Sans shot back. He winked, his grin wide. "y'know i could _drone_ on about this, kid, but i'd rather fly."

Sans kept following the path around the fountain, brushing off the girl. She looked floored. How rude of her. She could have killed Sans so easily right there considering how fragile he is. She could have at least apologized.

 _No, she really couldn't have. Killing Sans is hard._

"So... We'll talk about the time travel later then?" Frisk asked as he caught up to Sans. The skeletons stopped and turned around.

"guess so. wanna go back... heh. almost said home. how's about heading back to not-so-home?"

Frisk was going to agree, but someone stopped him. By the stairs off the grounds was a group of boys. A couple of them had skate boards and we're trying to do tricks off of the stairs and a nearby bench with varying success. It was such impressive shredding, it could've hurt someone from pure awesome, or something. No it couldn't. One of them was playing rock music that Frisk couldn't recognize, due to his poor taste in music. Frisk did recognize one of the skaters, regardless of taste.

"Trevor!" He greeted. The boy in question looked up from his phone. He gave them a confused half wave that said he was actually processing the world around him.

"Hey... Hey! What's up, dude. Skeleton dude. Goat dude," Trevor said as the world returned to him. "Guess your visit today got crashed, huh?"

"Yeah, looks like it," Frisk said.

"Any idea what set off the alarm?" Asriel asked.

"Nah dude. I wasn't even in the building anymore. I was just waiting out here for my bros when it went off."

"Hey Trevor," one of said bros started. He had a dirty yellow hair buried under a hat, and poorly maintained facial hair. "Mind introducing me to the monster mash?"

"Right, of course. Justin, these are the special guests that has had the school freaking out. Special guests, this is Justin. He's okay I guess."

"Pft, okay man," Justin said. "What are your names actually, though? I've seen you on the news, I think. Maybe."

"hiya. i'm sans. sans the skeleton." He extended a bony arm out to Justin, which the skater boy took happily. He jumped as soon as they made contact. Frisk could see a shocker on Sans's palm that hadn't been there seconds ago.

"Son of a bi-bi-... Er... beach ball?" Justin was looking at Frisk and Asriel as he stuttered through his curse. He looked down and saw the device in Sans's hand and the mischief in his eyes. "Man, you got me good."

"hehe, didn't i? the little ones are asriel and frisk. not sure which one is which."

"Sans! You know exactly who's who," Asriel declared loudly. Too loudly. A few of the students around them were staring, a fact which Asriel became acutely aware of. He continued more quietly, "I'm Asriel. He's Frisk." The stares shifted away, as the goat made it evident he wasn't going to yell again.

Justin refused to shake either of their hands. For safety reasons most likely. The rest of the guys around them largely just gave them curious looks, but stayed out of the conversation. At some point the fire alarm had turned off. As their introductions concluded, the speakers crackled to life over the campus, carrying the voice of Principal Wells over the grounds.

"Would Nathan Prescott please report to my office immediately." The speakers died.

"Ooo, busted," Frisk sang. Trevor shook his head.

"Not likely. Dude's dad practically owns the school," Trevor said. "I don't really care for the guy. You met him yet?" Frisk shook his head. "Well, if you're all so important as to get the red carpet treatment from Wells, odds are you're going to."

Frisk and Asriel shared a glance. They then tried to share one with Sans, but he didn't have enough eyes for the both of them.

Frisk sat against the wall by Trevor and looked back at the school. The girl with the drone was still flying it around, keeping it high above the walkway. She caught Frisk staring and shook her head. I don't like that one.

 _Do you like this one?_ Frisk asked, pointing at himself.

He's okay, I guess.

Frisk pouted, drawing concerned looks from those around him. Sans looked at him curiously.

"hey kiddo, 'dog for your thoughts?"

"Bribery will get you no where, Sans," Frisk said. "Especially because you don't have a hot dog."

The skeleton shrugged. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a frank, bun and all. It meowed when he bit into it. Trevor blinked. Justin blinked. The other guys scooted a bit farther away. Even the watchful eye of Jeremiah's statue seemed to do a double take.

"Uh..." Trevor's eyes asked more than words ever could. It was with mock apology that Frisk could only shrug.

"Frisk wasn't wrong, Sans. That wasn't a 'dog," Asriel cut in. "Anyway, we should get going, shouldn't we?"

"Huh, why?" Frisk asked.

Asriel frowned. He mouthed the words 'dime rapper' and nodded his head vaguely back at the school. An image of a hand slapping into its owners face passed through Frisk's thoughts, absolutely radiating disappointment. Actually, it looked kind of like his own face. _What?_

I believe incorrigible is the word I seek.

"That's cool," Trevor said. "You're going to be in town all week, right? If you get the chance, we should all hang. There's a few cool spots 'round town, and all of you are pretty funny."

"Aww, Trevor. Cmon, man. They're kids. We'd have to, like, behave ourselves!" Justin groaned. Frisk smiled at that.

"Right. Of course you'd behave for a prince," Frisk said. He looked straight at the skaters in such a way that he grew taller than them. Older. Authoritative. Both of the boys recognized that there was a change, and Frisk reveled in their fear. "You're expected to bow before royalty, don't you know?"

"Frisk..." Asriel warned.

"And besides, could anything be considered trouble if it's done under the direct orders of a prince?" Frisk continued, looking straight at Justin. Frisk turned to Asriel, who's mouth was hanging open. "Come, my liege. We should leave the peasants to ponder. Come, jester, for duty calls!"

Frisk marched off in the vaguely defined direction of away, his shoulders high and his eyes forward. Away, as it turned out, was not down the stairs off the campus. He would have gone that way, but marching down stairs would have gone against both his current position of power and his desire to explore. There was still an entire school laid out before him, and with Wells currently occupied, he had nothing to shackle him! Instead he was heading towards the pool building to the left of the main building. There was a path behind it, and Frisk needed to know where it lead.

His march brought him past the rude girl and her drone. She was talking to another girl that Frisk didn't think he'd seen before who was wearing a hoodie and a shirt with a deer on it. It was a cute shirt.

"Ugh, I knew it. You don't know a thing about drones, do you?" The drone girl said.

"I uh... no," the girl responded.

"Whatever. Leave me be."

The conversation didn't seem to be going well. Frisk had half a mind to give miss drone a talking to. Maybe try and make her so uncomfortable she lost the will to ACT that way. In fact, he was going to do that!

Frisk please no...

"Hey, you!" He said, looking straight at the rude girl as Chara's prayers went unanswered. Both girls looked at him surprised. "What's your name?"

"Excuse me?" The girl asked, her head tilting. "I uh... I'm... Brooke? Can I help you?"

"Yes you can. First off, the red highlight in your hair looks great," Frisk said. Brooke blinked, and deer-shirt girl took a step away from the situation. "Second off, there is no need to be so rude to everyone!"

"Huh? Why is a kid... aren't you the kid with the monsters?" Brooke asked, folding her arms. Frisk nodded. "Well... Listen kid, this is none of your-"

There was a distinctly cutting clink, and Brooke's eyes shrunk. Frisk followed her gaze. Just in front of Jebediah was the wreckage of a drone. Poor Jeb had a fresh cut where his nose had been. A nose that was now as nonfunctional as Brooke's expensive machine. Frisk stared for a moment. The school yard was quiet. Frisk turned back to a babbling Brooke.

"God dammit!" She yelled. She marched over to Frisk and jabbed a finger in his face. "Look what you made me do, you brat! Do you know how expensive a drone is!"

"I... Uh..." Frisk was not trained for this situation. _Was that my fault?_

"now easy there, friend," Sans said from behind Frisk. "drone flies just fine."

With a groan, Brooke stared down intently at her drone controller and started to mash controls. She was rewarded with sputtering and disappointment.

"No it doesn't! It's..." Brooke's jaw dropped. Frisk turned around to see the wreckage enveloped by a blue shroud. San's left eye flickered between blue and orange as the drone barely defied gravity.

"What the fuck?" One of the students yelled.

"What's it doing?" A girl yelled. Sans didn't put down the drone. Asriel was tugging at Sans's hoodie.

"Um... Sans? Maybe you should..."

Frisk surveyed the courtyard. All eyes were on them and the glowing drone. Everyone and everything else was forgotten for them. This was scary. Frisk was trying to figure out a way he could salvage this situation. Maybe it wasn't common knowledge that monsters were magical over here? But they had Muffet... Beads of sweat were starting to drip out of Sans's skull.

"Alright, that's enough!" A voice came from the school building. Frisk turned to see the security guard he saw in the hall earlier marching down the steps towards them. He got in Sans's face, towering over the skeleton, and stabbed his finger through the air to land just short of the skeleton's not-nose. "Put down the drone!"

"Really?" The girl in the deer shirt muttered. She looked trapped in the situation. Brooke looked similar caught. All around them the school watched their misfortune. _Nothing so thrilling as a crackdown is there?_

"hey... david," Sans was squinting his glowing eye at the name tag on the security guard's shirt. "mind if i call you dave?"

"Now you listen here-"

"great. now dave. you're doing your job. that's cool. more than i would do really. but we just had a fight brewing and i was just trying to deescalate. no harm in that, right?"

"No harm, my ass!" David said without hesitation. "I don't know how you all 'deescalated' in your cave, but out here we don't magic up other people's shit!" He turned to look at Brooke. "Shit that, may I remind you Brooke, is not allowed on Blackwell property?"

"What? But..." But David was already moving on, looking straight at the girl in the deer shirt, who looked ready to bolt. Much like the animal on her shirt, however, the girl was caught in the headlights of a speeding car.

"And how the how did you get caught up in _this_ problem?" David demanded.

"I didn't do anything!" The girl insisted.

"Right. Just like you weren't doing anything in the hall." David adjusted his hat, covering his eyes further in shadow. "Now, Mister 'Skeleton.' Drop the damn drone. I'll take it from here."

Sans stared straight at David, then at Brooke. He looked at the kids last. Then he shrugged and the drone pieces hit the concrete. The wreckage became more wreckage. David gave Sans one last glare before trying to pick up the pieces.

"God damn..." Whatever David was mumbling was lost. Brooke stormed by them a moment later, heading away from the pool area.

"Well..." The deer girl said. She pulled out her camera, aimed it straight at the destruction before her, and snapped a shot. No flash. She grabbed the picture as it slid out of her camera and shook it. She gave it a quick look before stuffing the picture and her camera in her bag.

"Asriel does that too," Frisk said suddenly. The girl jumped a bit. "Does it actually help?"

"Uh... Yeah?" The girl said. "I've always done it like that?"

There was a flash beside Frisk. David let out a curse, and there was a clattering noise. He turned to see Asriel shaking his own picture of the wreck. David was grumbling as he hauled the bits towards the main building.

"What a jerk," Asriel said.

"You said it..." The girl said. "I wish that all didn't happen. How am I going to fix that?"

Frisk shrugged. "I don't know. It would probably be expensive."

The girl looked down. Frisk couldn't really read the expression on her face.

"Hey, um... Frisk, right?" She asked. Frisk nodded. "Thanks for your help. Even if it didn't work out."

"Eh, it's what I do," he shrugged. "So, what's-"

"I'm sorry," the girl said. "We're going to have to meet some other time. I have to fix this real quick."

"What do you-" the girl raised her hand and the world disappeared for a blink.

"Frisk..." Asriel warned, a simple voice. Frisk blinked. His head hurt, and he was staring at Trevor with his vertebrae stacked high. He was about five minutes ago, give or take.

"Uh..." Frisk blinked. He cleared his throat. "I mean... And besides! I... We uh..." Frisk drooped over. "I lost it. Darn. Yeah, we should... Uh, hang out? I don't think me or Asriel will have any trouble keeping up with whatever you want to do. Right?" Frisk turned to Asriel in hopes of rescue. Asriel just shrugged.

Justin snorted. Trevor chuckled as well. Sans and Asriel looked concerned. That was unlike you. You dork with confidence. Regularly.

Frisk looked at his monster companions and nodded his head in the same vague direction of away that would've lead them towards the pool building. They left the skater dudes without another word.

Frisk glanced over by Brooke. The girl with the deer on her shirt wasn't talking to her this time, and she had all of her concentration on her drone. Frisk stopped and looked around the campus. On the opposite side of the yard, he could see a the girl disappear around the corner. _Chara... I think I found our dime rapper._

...

Wait. Are you serious?

* * *

 **Had trouble finding a stopping point for this one. I originally planned for a different spot to be the cut off point, but this was taking too long and scenes were suffering from me trying to speed through them. This chapter and the next (When/if it's out) were originally going to be one chapter. I didn't want this story to have 20,000 word chapters like my other story, so I cut it off here.**

 **Frisk's part of the chapter threw me for a loop as fifteen different ideas tried to fight for a spot in the final story. It took a lot of writing and rewriting to get it to this point, where it isn't either extremely underwhelming nor too much too fast.**

 **See you for the next chapter. It'll be one hella good time.**


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